'The Boogeyman' is based on a Stephen King story. Too bad it's not scary

Presumably, “based on a short story by Stephen King” is a boost at the box office for movies.

Sadly, it’s not a guarantee of quality. Ever seen “The Mangler?” No? Probably for the best.

“The Boogeyman” carries on that unfortunate tradition. It’s a pretty bad movie — not particularly scary, not easy to follow, not a bit of fun.

But it’s also weird. It is, we learn in the credits, indeed based on the King story of the same name, from his 1978 collection “Night Shift.” Sort of. A couple of the characters in the film share names with characters from the book, and one of them does similar things.

Other than that, it’s a completely different story. And a lesser one.

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What is 'The Boogeyman' about?

Mind you, there is no prohibition against changing a story around when you adapt it as a movie. A shot-for-shot copy would bore a good filmmaker. But if you’re going to change it, as least make it better.

Will Harper (Chris Messina) is a therapist whose wife recently died in a car accident. He is mourning, in a denial kind of way, along with his daughters Sadie (Sophie Thatcher) and Sawyer (Vivien Lyra Blair). It’s a challenge.

It’s particularly difficult for Sadie. Her “friends” at school — friends being a fluid term at her age — are at best incapable of being truly sympathetic. Or maybe they’re just jerks. (In the case of one girl, definitely that.)

One day a man named Lester Billings (David Dastmalchian) wanders in off the street and into Will’s home office. Will doesn’t take walk-ins, but the man is clearly troubled, so he listens. And it is quite a story — about the death of the man’s children, and what he says killed them. (Most people assume he did it.)

Things get worse from there. A lot worse. And soon Sadie and Sawyer are hearing strange noises at night, catching fleeting glimpses of something just out of their line of vision. Will is skeptical, as adults always are, but Sadie is determined to put a stop to whatever it is that is becoming more and more menacing.

Director Rob Savage can handle a basic jump scare, of which there are a few. He’s less successful at building a sense of dread. In a great horror movie dread hangs over the whole thing like invisible fog. “The Boogeyman” needs more of it.

Instead we get a steady stream of doom and gloom. The film is relentlessly bleak, with no relief. That doesn’t build tension. It’s just exhausting.

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But mostly what the movie needs is a more coherent story. While keeping an audience off-kilter and disoriented is a worthy goal, particularly in a horror film, it’s got to add up to something. In this case it’s more like meandering.

Thatcher is actually quite good. As she grows more confident (or desperate) to fend off evil, she manages to hang on to Sadie’s sense of grief. It’s really her movie, and she’s the best thing about it.

Messina is having a nice year — he’s great as smarmy agent David Falk in “Air.” This isn’t that. Here he’s wounded, sensitive and lost. Lost in the sense that the character just kind of wanders in and out of the story; as Sadie’s role grows, his diminishes, to the point that at times he disappears.

The short story is straightforward, a classic (if not imaginative) horror twist. It’s also difficult to imagine how it could be stretched to feature-film length without suffering. Having seen “The Boogeyman,” I’m more convinced than ever.

'The Boogeyman' 2 stars

Great ★★★★★ Good ★★★★

Fair ★★★ Bad ★★ Bomb ★

Director: Rob Savage.

Cast: Chris Messina, Sophie Thatcher, David Dastmalchian.

Rating: PG-13 for terror, violent content, teen drug use and some strong language.

How to watch: In theaters Friday, June 2.

Reach Goodykoontz at bill.goodykoontz@arizonarepublic.com. Facebook: facebook.com/GoodyOnFilm. Twitter: @goodyk.

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This article originally appeared on Arizona Republic: 'The Boogeyman' is a bust, and nothing like the Stephen King story