This is another one of those movies whose synopsis I have come across plenty of times, but I have never watched it. I believe that I have a couple of copies with me which I bought for really cheap. I do that often, purchase movies which I never watch and then forget that I have them. Only to buy them again. Recently, my husband and I sold a bunch of movies to Amazon. I can’t even explain to you how many times we had doubles and triples of the same movie.
As of now, I am not watching any of the copies I have. I am watching it on Netflix. My husband and bunny are watching this with me. Both of them seem equally uninterested in it as I am.
The film commences with a bang. It starts with a satanic cult with some cool masks stabbing a bound topless woman against a wall. After that we are introduced to the main characters. My first impression was that they were the most annoying bunch of college students in the world, but I guess they become better as the film proceeds.
At this point, these people are on their way to the rave, and believe me, the club drove me nuts. It has awful lighting, repetitive techno music, and women with glowing sticks are topless in cages. I am sure there are some people who live for these kind of places, but it is certainly not my cup of tea.
At the rave, Samantha (Jennifer Lyons), an exceptionally assertive chipmunk-voiced blonde, takes club ecstasy from the owner. She attempts to sex down her drug-dealing boyfriend, Eric (Bryan Kirkwood), but he informs her, “I’m selling.” So, she settles for some random guy she sees to kiss. The nice guy of the group, David (Charlie O’Connell), is approached concerning Eric’s violations, and one of the club workers goes for him. Try to tell the man that Samantha was given drugs from the owner but is met with indifference instead, which is what Susan (Ashley Jones), his girlfriend, begs him to do. Every single one of the group is booted out, which pisses off the last one left Joe (Rashaan Nall).
Fawn who is bathed in blood seems to be wandering on the road. She is captured in a daises state. Unable to brake, the individual drives right into her. They assist her into the car, and yet again, resume their drive. A group that tried slaughtering Fawn ends up driving them off the road. They do not cease until the ‘group car’ is completely overturned. While Joe is stuck with a tender ankle, and Samantha ends up hurt, a little bloody, and everyone else aside from Fawn, David and Susan get turned into whiny little bitches.
Still in masks, the cult gets out of the van to check that the vehicle is, in fact, dead. Once they see the group is trapped, they get out so they can commence the game of cat and mouse. At this point, everybody is forced to start moving. Everyone hears an engine and, despite people begging to be careful, Joe runs in front of the van and starts shouting for help. Naturally, it is the cult and he is pulled into the van. Did I mention that Joe happened to be African American? Okay, he wasn’t dead but for all intents and purposes, that was his character. That is correct, a horror picture from 2001 decided to off the black guy first. There is this saying “He never saw it coming.” He was the only main character devoid of a companion, he was given no distinct traits, and on top of that, he becomes the buffoon that leaps in front of a van in order to receive help. It might be coincidence, but it certainly seems calculated. The world is full of “Look, we are not racists” strategies.
We have a Black guy as a main character!” I apologize as I am being a bit harsh and overly judgmental but he left so quickly.
Later on sassy Samantha turns to Fawn and asks her why everyone is going to die. Fawn tells the group that the name of the cult was The Shadows, and that they wanted to sacrifice her to Satan.
To be honest, no one is really mourns or concerned for poor Joe all that much. The group ends up in a cabin trying to lay low. Samantha and arrogant Eric are arguing with Susan to try and force Fawn out. They argue about her right in front of the poor bloody girl. Fawn states that she feels bad about the position she put everyone in.
Now this is not exactly a spoiler since it is known since almost the beginning. When the people in the masks start attacking, the group learns that The Shadows consists of people from The Rave. The club owner is even amongst them.
The attitudes of Samantha and Eric are among the biggest problems in the film. While Samantha does apologize later in the film, she is scourging selfish. While I understand she’s frightened, her willingness to sacrifice another human being for her own self-preservation is mind-boggling. Moreover, she attempts to manipulate Susan into contrasting guilt for her failure to comply, even suggesting that Fawn wants to get David, which wasn’t the case at all.
It is obvious that Samantha has a rich and connected lawyer father, yet she behaves like she is richer than Paris Hilton. Samantha and Eric’s speeches, in which they claim that they do not want to be like their parents, indeed makes an attempt to recreate a The Breakfast Club (1985) moment.
Regardless of Eric’s attempts to redeem himself, in reality, he is still an insufferable jerk. You see, these are not 12 years old kids we’re talking about. They are college students. And Eric is actually willing to put Joe’s life in more danger just so he can conceal the fact that he used to be a drug dealer from the cops. The only way Eric agrees to this is when Susan says that she will tell the complete truth. There is no way that I understand why David, Joe, and Susan would want to be friends or even hang out with those people.
The group of kids slowly pull together this time as they try to leave until they finally make it to town. In doing so, they encounter a minister who says that he knows something about The Shadows. He takes them to the Sheriff (Tim Thomerson) who does not know the town. The group begins to notice unusual events happening throughout the town. It becomes quite evident that The Shadows are not working alone.
To sum it up, it is better than I had anticipated. I was having a difficult day at work and I wanted something I could watch passively. This movie is exactly that. Sometimes, it was reminiscent of a low-budget version of Race with the Devil, but more like a Lifetime movie. Don’t get me wrong it is truly terrible. To be honest, If this movie was a legitimate remake, I would absolutely hate it. I hated the idea of writing that the two ideas had a commonality, but there is a resemblance that one must accept when it comes to the plot.
The production has many amusing scenes and fun elements. Parts of it are noticeably slow, but not so much that I felt the urge to turn it off. As for the acting, it was what I expected. It was not great, but it was not horrible either. The characters, regardless of all the drawbacks, are fine and at least distinguishable from one another. They remind me of the characters in a high school drama show like 90210 or Veronica Mars. I wish, though, that Joe had been given a bit more to work with. Horror movies need those characters who are strictly there to be killed off, but as he was meant to be a main character and a friend of everyone, it would have been nice if he at least made an effort. If only, instead of just accepting the situation, he could have mentioned a hobby he enjoyed.
Also, I wish some music would have made it to the movie. It really could have used some heavy metal or hard rock music in scenes concentrating on Satanic cults, which is one of the many reasons it failed to deliver on this.
The last few scenes that were supposed to be suspenseful were laughably bad. My spouse, who always gets the scare, did not budge at all. That’s not my favorite method of planning scares and these ones were easily the weakest out of all of them.
In the end, it isn’t anything too great, but most shows are 10 times worse than this. If you’re bored with found footage, torture porn, and zombies this is a little more new. I would not go far out of my way to watch this, but it is perfect if you already have a Netflix account and need something to watch that is, at the very least, not complete trash.
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