Mandy Lane is the most sought after, and most unobtainable, girl in school. At a pool party, her best friend Emmet, apparently board with seeing the male populous of his school hit on his friend, convinces one drunken would-be suitor to go to extreme measures to try and impress Mandy... With tragic consequences.
9 months later, Mandy and Emmet's friendship is utterly distorted, and Emmet is more of an outcast than ever, while Mandy maintains her status as the ultimate "prize".
A student organises a vacation at his fathers ranch for himself and 5 friends (including Mandy, who he believes he can be the one to seduce) but when they arrive, it gradually becomes apparent that they have been followed by a madman, determined to take them all down one-at-a-time.
First of all, what is it with teenagers in movies? None if my friends were this horny all the time (not openly at least) it seems that writers don't know what to do with a bunch if teens if they haven't got them constantly taking drugs, screwing, or attempting to screw!
Secondly; when one character is supposed to be so much more attractive than every single other person in the movie, why do they always cast a bunch of people who are roughly equally attractive? For the first 15 minutes or so, I was convinced that there was going to me a supernatural element to the movie, i.e. That Mandy had cast done kind of attraction spell!
The movie is very well shot, and the acting and violence are both believable, the letdown here, sadly, is in the writing.
Once the kids arrive at the ranch, the movie becomes a fairly standard (albeit good looking) slasher, but we find out who the killer is entirely too soon, even though the movie continues to play out as though it's still a mystery.
And then there's a twist... Of course there is; this kind if movie had to have a twist, I think there's a law or something.
A good twist, even a goofy one, can really elevate an average (or worse) slasher into a great movie (Sleepaway Camp, I am looking in your direction) sadly a mediocre, ill explained twist has no such magical power.
The twist in this movie could be (movie logic) explainable, but it would require quite the in depth motive; Luckily for us there is one... or so we are told. While the killer has, apparently, gone to lengths to explain the motives and twist on paper, we never get to read it, and neither does anyone else.
We can kind-of work most of it out, and I'm a long way from thinking it essential that a movie explains every scene; but this one is a bit too big, and it feels like the screenwriters have just left us to do their job for them.
The movie has it's moments (The tragedy in the prologue had me holfing by breath, and a couple of the kills made my toes curl), but like so many films before it, I'd give this one a watch if it's on TV and there's nothing on another channel; but I wouldn't go out of my way.
Hmmm still would'nt mind a watch of it sometime.
ReplyDeleteThe impossibly attractive cast always irritates me somewhat too. No main cast member is ever allowed to be anything less than model attractive. If a person looks normal or wears glasses or is fat, they always turn out to be of not much importance or the killer.
It's not so much that they're impossibly attractive; its that the intentionally impossibly attractive girl is no more attractive than the rest of them.
ReplyDeleteAlthough now you mention it, there is one girl who's always dissing one of the others for being "fat", when she's probably technically underweight.