It’s not scary, slightly cheesy, and a little confusing (but not in a good way). While there’s an interesting twist at the end, you can’t help but feel completely robbed of time when this movie is over.

| Feb 22, 2023

Instead of turning the forest into a place where Japanese people find some kind of sad and disturbing comfort on a mass scale, the filmmakers have chosen to turn the place into a haunted house.

| Original Score: 1.5/4 | Apr 23, 2022

Playing both sisters, Natalie Dormer gives a compelling dual performance but she's saddled by the script's simplistic dialogue, which is often as wooden as the forest itself.

| Original Score: 2/5 | Jun 8, 2021

There's cliches in this movie for days.

| Original Score: 4/10 | Apr 30, 2021

Instead of an exploration of Japanese history and culture, the narrative is filtered through white, western eyes. Plodding and uninspired, not particularly frightening, and worst of all, boring.

| Original Score: C- | Jul 3, 2020

While director Jason Zada's first feature film stayed away from being a carbon copy of standard J-horror fare, it lacked the complexity and substance to hold a seasoned horror fan's attention.

| May 17, 2019

It's the kind of screenplay where a twist happens with no real set-up, mainly because it is the only way the writers can figure out how to get to the forced ending they want.

| Original Score: C- | Jan 17, 2019

It has ghosts, it has atmosphere, it's well-acted and scary. Yes, it tries too hard in some respects, but it's a respectable effort, and it works well enough to be worth watching.

| Original Score: B | Dec 7, 2018

Some bright spots do redeem The Forest's presentation. Otherwise, Zada's thin and jittery payoff is nothing more than a toothless trek through the pseudo petrified Forest.

| Original Score: 1.5/4 | Nov 9, 2018

The film simply failed to create a complete mythology in their plot based on the real life myths. The result felt like pieces of several different stories chopped up and thrown together in a way that lacked substance and scares.

| Original Score: 4.5/10 | Nov 2, 2018

There are times when Dormer honestly looks a little confused by what should scare her more, and I can't help but relate.

| Aug 20, 2018

The Forest desperately wants to be intelligent psychological horror but fails at every corner

| Original Score: 2/5 | Dec 4, 2017

Dormer is a refreshing presence but the film is short of genuine, grown-up scares.

| Oct 24, 2017

The Forest made me wonder if the reason we have yet to see the Matthew McConaughey/Ken Watanabe film Sea of Trees, also about Aokigahara, is because it's really hard to make a movie about the suicide forest that isn't tasteless and exploitative.

| Oct 14, 2017

Someone made the decision to economize on story and amp up the chase sequences.

| Sep 18, 2017

By the time the film reaches its ridiculous ending, it has stretched our disbelief to the point of failing to see the point for the trees.

| Original Score: D | Aug 1, 2017

The Forest [is] a decent horror movie that offers plenty of shriek-worthy moments. But its more interesting aspects are the repressed guilt and sorrow at its core.

| Mar 13, 2017

Rest assured your last camping trip packed more thrills.

| Original Score: 1/5 | Jan 2, 2017

Alas, there's no real sense of tension as the story (credited to three writers) lurches toward a by-the-numbers ending.

| Original Score: 2/4 | Dec 31, 2016

The Forest plunders the J-horror vocabulary to muster what jumps it can, and is pretty nice to look at. But only the really good horror films know how to end on a high note, and this isn't one of them.

| Original Score: 3/5 | Dec 5, 2016