"Hide and Seek" is one of the best horror films I've seen in awhile. It is about a psychologist, David Callaway (Robert DeNiro) whose wife commits suicide, and he decides to move to upstate New York with his daughter, Emily (Dakota Fanning), whose personality has severely changed after her mother's death. A family friend/psychologist/co-worker of David, Katherine (Famke Janssen) disagrees with David's decision to move, and thinks that Emily should stay where she is. Then after David and Emily move into their new house, David meets Elizabeth (Elisabeth Shue), who becomes a friend to David and Emily. Then strange things begin to happen - Emily discovers a new imaginary friend, Charlie. And then people start to die.
Robert DeNiro and Dakota Fanning are both brilliant, their performances were extremely real and convincing. Dakota is quite talented for her age, and DeNiro gives another great performance like he always does. Famke Janssen ("Don't Say A Word" and "House on Haunted Hill") also does great, and Elisabeth Shue ("The Karate Kid") is also very good. In fact, the whole cast was great. The whole film was really suspenseful, and it tricks you a lot. The atmosphere was heavy, I loved the whole feeling of the secluded upstate New York small-town, and the large house David and Emily move into.
I liked this movie because it was more psychological rather than chop and slash gore that most horror films use to scare people. "Hide and Seek" has a good, solid story behind it, which is why it is such a good horror film, and the acting is top notch on top of it all. I don't understand everyone's problem with this movie, it was actually quite good. Sure, the ending is a little cliché, but the rest of the movie was good enough on it's own. 8/10.