So The Tall Man and Sinister: Films inspired by Slenderman?

[CrimsonBlaze]

So I've been seeing trailers for movies for the last few months and there have been two particular trailers that have stuck in my mind because they had a lot of similar elements to Slenderman.

The first was Sinister


and the second was The Tall Man.


Sinister is probably the one who is most engrossed in Slenderman; they just made him appear terrifying to the general audience who does not know about Slenderman and therefore, not find his faceless head and suit very intimidating.

The Tall Man is probably the harder film to find a correlation to Slenderman, but I guess the concept was to portray Slenderman as a realistic child abductor/killer.

So I ask you, Escapists: Did these films draw inspiration from Slenderman or is it merely coincidence?

 

[Thaluikhain]

Eh, they both look very generic to me. The first looked like a very jump scream heavy slasher monster thing, the second just another serial child abductor.

...

Anyone else disappointed that this wasn't Yahtzee's Tall Man?

 

[Voidrunner]

Obviously based on Slenderman but they seemed to have diminished the attributes that made him creepy in favour of turning him into a cheap jump scare. From what I see in the Tall Man trailer it looked as though the abductor was escaping in a van at one point which almost made me laugh at the thought of Slenderman hanging around the streets in a "FREE CANDY" van.

 

[Marter]

The first one, sure. Sinister certainly gave me that kind of vibe when I first saw the trailer. I'm not sure if I'm buying it for The Tall Man, though. It just ... doesn't seem that way to me, I guess. It's more of a stretch in the first place, and it simply doesn't feel as if Slenderman was the inspiration for the villain.

 

[Gatx]

Just conceptually on a surface level the Tall Man sounds like a Slenderman movie, you have the title and the premise of abducting children, though the movie itself from what I've read on Wikipedia seems more like a psychological thriller than a horror movie.

Personally I don't think a good Slenderman movie can come out of Hollywood. Best stick to Youtube videos. They have that added "meta" element to it because of the medium.

 

[The Unworthy Gentleman]

Films take inspiration from a whole host of things, Slenderman has been around long enough and garnered enough attention to be one of these sources. The Tall Man sounds like a reference to Slendie and then the child abduction aspect adds to that but there's likely material from actual serial abductors that added to it along with other stories. Sinister looks like it draws more from the Slenderman well but that too will have other material it's based on.

In both cases they aren't just rips of Slenderman. Slenderman is hardly an original story anyway, it's just a serial abductor and murderer with supernatural aspects thrown in for added creep.

 

[Zack Alklazaris]

The is one ugly kid...

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The first one I really don't see any collation, but I am not an expert in "Slenderman" so it might be just me. The second one looks like its taken elements off it, but then why not take the whole thing? Its not copywrited its an internet craze.

 

[Zhukov]

I actually found that first trailer pretty creepy.

...

Yeah... I am a total sissy when it comes to horror movies.

 

[Scarim Coral]

Consider the popularity of Slenderman had been made these days (especially with the game) it doesn't suprise me they had try to borrow element of the Slenderman mythos and made their own for the film.
The Sinister film is more closer to Slenderman as The Tall Man doesn't doesn't look related at all other than the name. Even then the tall man is seen to be more focus as a tall person being a child abductor.

 

[xshadowscreamx]

well sinister looks good and the closest to slender man, the tall man has the name but it looks like every other generic slashers. trust me i have seen many.

 

[Flames66]

Obviously based on Slenderman but they seemed to have diminished the attributes that made him creepy in favour of turning him into a cheap jump scare. From what I see in the Tall Man trailer it looked as though the abductor was escaping in a van at one point which almost made me laugh at the thought of Slenderman hanging around the streets in a "FREE CANDY" van.

It amuses me that they seem to have given away half the plot and alot of clues about the identity of the tall man in the trailer.