Review: 'Longlegs' Has Us Running Back to Our Childhood Fears

What was the first thing that ever scared you? You probably recall your younger years being rattled by something going bump in the night.

The first scene of Longlegs evokes this nightmarish nostalgia when a young girl comes face to out-of-frame face with our unsettling antagonist. Unnerved by the voice of Nicolas Cage (“Longlegs”) and 8mm-esque cinematography, we’re asked to return to our “stranger danger” days.

This spooky simplicity is what gives Longlegs its — dare I say — legs. The extensive marketing campaign — ranging from crime scene evidence on social media to billboards with phone numbers that delivered Nicolas Cage’s voice — raised expectations for moviegoers, implying an edge-of-your-seat, suspenseful scare fest. Although it might not have delivered raised hairs on the back of your neck, don’t get it twisted: Longlegs is haunting.

That’s to be expected because director/writer Oz Perkins grew up with horror. When he was less than 10 years old, he starred in Psycho II , in which he briefly appeared as the 12-year-old version of the Norman Bates character his father portrayed. How perfect that he’s now toying with childhood terror.

This interaction with the not-so-joyful side of the 1990s seems to be a summer trend. Also in theaters right now is I Saw The TV Glow , in which director Jane Schoenbrun freaks us out with a Throwback Thursday we never expected. Surely this has been done before, but perhaps not to this scale, significance and poignance.

While I Saw The TV Glow is seen as a deeply dark metaphor about LGBTQIA+ self-recognition and self-acceptance, Longlegs walks through faith, fear and family — and more specifically, where they all intersect.

On the surface, Longlegs reads like a crime procedural we’ve seen before: a spooky serial killer on the loose being sought by a determined yet inexperienced investigator. But the worthwhile nuance lies in its cinematography and self-aware, almost comical lens. During some of the darkest scenes of the film, lines of dialogue that are so bizarre and almost too-on-the-nose draw laughter. This feels intentional — once again, returning us to a primal level of dread.

Longlegs comes from filmmakers who have been in this space before, with a tongue-in-cheek terror that leaves us with the heebie-jeebies. Not to diminish the strength of the story, but I think it’s the style — not the screenplay — that will shake you from your slumber.