Tick, tock, fall is here!

As of September 21st, Autumn had officially made its debut in the United States. However, this year September 21st also marked the unveiling of The House with a Clock in Its Walls in theaters. Right now, the movie is unparalleled in theaters. It's started strong bringing in a revenue of about $26.9 million dollars on its first opening weekend in 3,592 locations.

In case you haven’t heard what the movie is about, here’s the gist: It's the year 1955, Michigan. Ten-year-old Lewis had lost his parents in a tragic accident and his uncle Jonathan, played the marvelous Jack Black, welcomes his young nephew with open arms. Almost immediately, Lewis started noticing the peculiar details about the house and his uncle. The most suspicious thing being the strange ticking that was heard within the walls at night.

The movie was a really enjoyable family-friendly movie, that even had some adults laughing in the theater. The film wasn't meant to be any sort of real horror, mostly just suspense. If anything, the real thrill came from watching Lewis slowly piecing together the mystery that was left within the fixture of the house. Lewis, who is played by Owen Vaccaro, is a character that you would have to learn to love. He is very smart, and his quirky personality is what makes him seem somewhat unapproachable. Even though he made some bad decisions in the movie and some of his actions can be seen more of annoying than adorable, he enacted some sort of sympathy that made you forgive him by the end of the movie.

Jack Black played his part splendidly, playful and funny as always, but the movie sort of requested a somewhat more unforthcoming facade from Jonathan than what Jack played. Cate Blanchett's character was by far my favorite. She played Jonathan Barnavelt’s neighbor, Mrs. Zimmerman who has a strong affiliation with the color purple and endearing dry humor. I think her character filled in some of the parts that Jack Black’s didn’t, especially when it came to keeping some things hidden from Lewis.

The House with a Clock in Its Walls was formerly just a mystery book written in 1973 by the late John Bellairs. The novel was the first in a twelve novel series published that followed the life of Lewis. The movie didn't leave any loose ends to a point where it felt like it was needed to follow it up with the book instead, but it did leave the possibility open of more adventures with Lewis that would hopefully be continued in the rest of the series.

Unquestionably, I would recommend that anyone should go see this in theaters. Especially if you want to get into the Halloween mood. If you want to be on somewhat of the thrifty side, then you should go ahead and try to catch the early bird special at Cinemark. It's a little bit cheaper than it's evening show prices so your wallet can leave happy too.