HORROR WEEK: Final Destination

Ah, yet another fine premise hindered by horrible execution. Final Destination, the film that spawned four subsequent installments, may be dumb, but it’s dumb fun nonetheless. Sure, it’s basically no different than thousands of other young adult movies about kids who have amazing powers (Harry Potter, Percy Jackson, etc), but Destination seems to understand why movies like those are so bad, and even play off of them a little. It’s not a spoof, but parts of it are so ludicrous and hilariously over-the-top, it’s hard not to laugh.

Final Destination stars a plethora of child actors (most of whom will be recognized by any X-Files aficionados out there) as a group of French class students. While en route to Paris for a school trip, a student named Alex has a prophetic vision that the plane they are on will crash, causing him to leap out of his seat, cause a panic, and get off the plane with a few of his classmates. Of course, as it always is in these kinds of movies, Alex is right and the plane blows up on takeoff.

This is an epic premise, and gives way to an astoundingly awesome series of events that pits Alex against the FBI, who clearly think the circumstances are a bit suspect. It’s got a little bit of that ‘question authority’ factor that I (as a teenager) enjoy so much in movies. But a lot of the acting is pretty bad, especially from the main characters. It’s not like you’re supposed to really take the movie seriously, but most of the characters overemphasize their dialogue, making the whole thing feel more like an MTV video than a serious horror movie (which it isn’t). This is pretty much the horror equivalent of a Michael Bay movie: Character development is virtually nonexistent, but for clean and unbridled craziness, this is what you want.

The deaths themselves are amazingly ludicrous, to the point of outright slapstick humor. I never thought I’d laugh out loud at a woman being impaled by a set of kitchen knives, but I definitely did here. Sadly, this was not really the filmmaker’s intent, because the movie is SUPPOSED to be truly scary. However, it’s hard to be terrified when you’re watching a guy slip on toilet water, fall into his shower, and get strangled by the shower curtain. Not to mention a girl who walks into the street, says “You can all drop dead,” and then gets hit by a bus. Shock humor is fun, and this movie utilizes it to no end. By the time the final sequence rolls around (which involves a clothesline and lightning), you’re watching a movie so gleefully ridiculous you can’t help but enjoy it.

But at its core, Final Destination is really nothing more than an empty, fluffy film that just so happens to have an intriguing premise. There’s not much else that sets it apart from the pack, no memorable scenes, bad acting, bad dialogue, and some pretty dumb sequences. It pains me to say this, because I actually had fun watching it, but it’s nothing more than nonsensical gore and asinine plot points. Its central premise relies on the characters finding messages that death itself sends them, but why does death have a plan OR pattern, and if it did, why would it share it with them? Cheating death is one thing. Cheating the audience, though... that’s the anus of cinema.

Final Score for Final Destination: 4/10 stars. Much like Kick-Ass, Pacific Rim, and Event Horizon, this is an immensely entertaining movie to watch, and the perfect bargain-buy horror movie rental for a slow weekend. Sure, it’s filled with obnoxious characters and confusing death sequences, but that’s what movies like this are made for: Hilarious in-home commentary. It’s by no means a good movie. However, for outside-the-box concepts and chaotic gore, there’s no better place to turn to.

HORROR WEEK: American Psycho

Good news, drama fans-- Social commentary is alive and well in the world of cinema. It’s not often that a director can blend horror and scathing humor in such an effective way as in American Psycho, but it’s definitely pulled off here. One doesn’t usually look for biting wit in a horror movie-- especially not one about a psychopathic Wall Street partner who murders people in his spare time-- but the beauty of American Psycho is that you don’t even have to look for it. It hits you over the head with the bludgeoning force of pure insanity.

American Psycho stars Christian Bale as Pat Bateman, a well-off member of the creme de la creme of Wall Street. He has a corner office, a hot secretary, a fiance, and a beautiful penthouse with an epic view. However, he also has a crippling addiction to murder. Firstly, let me say that I loved how well the film plays off of horror movies of old, giving Psycho a fresh and undeniably entertaining twist, while still being original enough to have merit of its own. Instead of presenting us with the typical horror tale, it puts a twist on everything, making the killer the lead, and in the process forcing the audience to become accomplices to his killings. Undoubtedly, those watching it will feel the same malice that Bateman does when murdering innocent people. Which is unsettling... but that’s the point.

Before seeing American Psycho, I was under the impression that Bale was a bit of a bland, boring, and overrated actor. His performances in The Dark Knight trilogy and Rescue Dawn were overrated at best, and his line delivery (especially if it sounds like he has throat cancer) is weak. However, this performance blew me away. Never before have I seen the character of a serial killer tackled with such precision, intensity, and outright glee. He injects an incredible amount of energy into an otherwise one-note character, and the result is some truly classic scenes. Bale has never been more entertaining to watch, and if for nothing else, see American Psycho for him.

The dialogue is spectacular for the most part, but the haphazard scripting is often saved by Bale’s giddy insanity. Coining such seemingly innocuous (yet, in context, extremely creepy) lines such as “Do you like Huey Lewis and the News?” the movie trucks along at a mile a minute, keeping the audience riveted. When one makes a shock/thriller like this, they are forced into outperforming themselves in every scene as the movie progresses, so as not to let up on the suspense. But American Psycho will keep asses in the seats... provided that the audience members don’t have weak stomachs.

But although American Psycho definitely deserves commendation for its epic scripting and memorable performances, it can’t help but be a little scattershot. At the end of the day, the movie boils down to a series of well-done yet emotionally empty scenes that have little weight to carry. It’s pretty haphazard, but as long as you don’t expect it to be very coherent, you’ll have a good time. And really, it’s hard to be picky when you get to see Christian Bale axing a guy in the forehead yelling “TRY GETTING A RESERVATION AT DORSIA NOW, YOU FUCKING STUPID BASTARD!!!”

And really, American Psycho is a horror/thriller, but it’s also a commentary on the mentality of Wall Street, capitalism, and society in general. There are scenes that borrow heavily from horror classics, sure. But the movie is at its best when it shows the insanity of the banking world as crazier than Bateman himself. One scene, in which Bateman and his friends sit around a table comparing each other’s business cards and sizing the competition up, speaks a lot more about the world of money than the world of serial killers. Not only is it entertaining, but those who have soul-crushing jobs in the industry should take away a lot from it.

Final Score for American Psycho: 8/10 stars. Not only is this film terrifying, it’s terrifyingly ACCURATE. It portrays a man who is crazy in two ways: For power and for blood. And surprisingly, the time when he is craziest is when he is leading a normal life, pretending to be a whole person. “There is an idea of a Patrick Bateman; some kind of abstraction. But there is no real me: only an entity, something illusory. And though I can hide my cold gaze, and you can shake my hand and feel flesh gripping yours and maybe you can even sense our lifestyles are probably comparable... I simply am not there.” I couldn’t have said it better myself.