Despite some gruesome special effects, the telling of this story is so prosaic and predictable that genuine thrills are in very short supply.
Comment
02/27/09
The Unborn (2009)
12
%
Tomatometer
How does the Tomatometer work 
Reviews Counted:103
Fresh:12
Rotten:91
Average Rating:3.2/10
Consensus: David Goyer's Unborn is a tame genre effort with cheap thrills and scares that border on silliness.
Australian Theatrical Release:
Feb 26, 2009 Wide
US Box Office: $42,638,165
Synopsis: Sometimes the soul of a dead person has been so tainted with evil that it is denied entrance to heaven. It must endlessly wander the borderlands between worlds, desperately searching for a new body... [More]
Starring: Odette Yustman, Gary Oldman, Meagan Good, Idris Elba
Director: David Goyer
Reviews for The Unborn
Top CriticThe script tries hard to delve into the folklore of a dybbuk, and as it mixes this in with experiments on twins in concentration camps during WW2, the story becomes too convoluted for its own good.
02/27/09
Top CriticSome of the ideas here may seem original, if questionable, but the treatment -- by writer-director David Goyer -- is strictly conventional, with the shock moments obviously inserted at regular intervals, usually while the heroine is in her underwear.
03/06/09
Top CriticOdette Yustman, indeed all the cast, deserve a better fate than to be sucked into this misguided attempt at horror
02/23/09
Top CriticEven for the run-of-the-mill, first of the year horror flick, The Unborn is pretty much a miscarriage.
01/09/09
The film's story is not so much plagued by plot holes as it is constructed out of them, not unlike an especially lacy variety of Swiss cheese.
01/16/09
Well, there are some effective scares here, and you'll laugh at yourself afterward just for jumping and squealing like a little girl. But other images and pieces of dialogue are just as hilarious -- and that probably wasn't their intention.
01/07/09
What darkness the movie achieves comes solely from the lighting.
01/09/09
What The Unborn represents manages to be a thousand times more disturbing than anything Goyer captured with his pen or camera
07/28/09
Stillborn.
01/09/09
The Unborn is a story that should have remained untold and will be forgotten by the end of the weekend.
06/10/09
Click to read the article
04/23/09
If the films released during the traditional January dumping ground are going to be this bad, we should employ the nation's best scientists to rearrange Earth's orbit so the year begins in February.
01/08/09
After three feature films of discouraging quality, Goyer suits up in a beret and jodhpurs again for The Unborn, which holds the miserable distinction of being the most dreadful film he's fashioned to date.
01/08/09
Brazen in its borrowings and alternating between cynicism and silliness, this is a creatively barren effort that should have been stopped at conception.
02/27/09
Filmed in Chicago but universal in its lameness...The Unborn is the story of a dybbuk who makes trouble for the skinny North Shore college girl played by Odette Yustman, who's always out jogging when she should be considering a sandwich.
01/09/09
Click to read the article
02/27/09
...comes across like a Jewish version of The Exorcist, mixed with a touch of Rosemary's Baby by way of The Omen.
01/09/09
An early contender for worst movie of the year.
01/09/09
There is a senseless scare every 5-7 minutes. Now, after one or two you start to get the giggles but after the third or fourth false scare you begin to Laugh Out Loud.
07/15/09
Latest News for The Unborn
July 06, 2009:
RT on DVD: Knowing, Push, The Unborn Unleashed
It's a genre lover's feast this week on DVD, but don't say we didn't warn you about those pesky rotten Tomatometers. First up? Alex Proyas's latest science fiction thriller,... More...
January 19, 2009:
Though some images are on the terrifying side, this mostly outlandish tale is riddled with homicidal tots, interdenominational exorcists, and attention deficit disorder dybuks who can't make up their mystical minds which body is cool enough to inhabit. 
More...
January 09, 2009:
Though some images are on the terrifying side, this mostly outlandish tale is riddled with homicidal tots, interdenominational exorcists, and attention deficit disorder dybuks who can't make up their mystical minds which body is cool enough to inhabit.
More...
January 08, 2009:
Critics Consensus: Say "I Don't" To Bride Wars
This week at the movies, we've got a bridal battle (Bride Wars, starring Anne Hathaway and Kate Hudson); a cranky car enthusiast (Gran Torino, directed by and starring Clint... More...
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