Pascal Laugier finally followed his extreme, controversial 2008 horror picture Martyrs with a Jessica Biel-starrer, The Tall Man — but the results might not exactly be proportional. His next effort, The Tall Man, has been getting some basd notices since it premiered at SXSW this past March, and, with a first trailer, those criticisms look all the more clear.

On top of the very cheap production values, everything about this tale — in which Jessica Biel goes searching for her kid, snatched up by a towering figure clad in black — seems fairly standard issue; a shame, since the shocking content in Laugier‘s prior film allowed it to really stand out. This time, I fear his film will come and go without much notice.

Watch the trailer below (via /Film):

Here’s a poster (via BloodyDisgusting):

Synopsis:

“A darkness hovers upon the town of Cold Rock. Children have gone missing over the years leaving neither a clue, nor a witness. Superstitious locals talk of ‘The Tall Man,’ a legendary, mysterious dark figure who takes children away never to be seen again. Julia (Biel) is a nurse living in Cold Rock who doesn’t believe in legends. That is, until one night, she wakes with an eerie feeling only to find her son’s bed empty. Frantic, she rushes downstairs where she stops dead in her tracks – a huge dark figure stands in the entrance holding her son, David. Driven by pure instinct, Julia rushes after them willing to do whatever it takes to get her son back. The chase is on and with it, the quest for answers. Who is the Tall Man? And what has become of the children?”

Jodelle Ferland, Stephen McHattie, Samantha Ferris, and William B. Davis star in The Tall Man, which will go into limited release on August 31st.

Has The Tall Man made its case with this preview?