Rating: Summary: Confusing and stupid Review: This may look good after reading the back cover, but it's not what it seems. I hate when that happens. The whole movie is some kind of dream/alternate reality that just makes NO sense! Don't bother even renting this one. It's very stupid.
Rating: Summary: messy ripoff of better horror films Review: The packaging & marketing made this film sound like (the much superior FINAL DESTINATION). Group of college-bound kids suffer an accident, but then...who's dead? Who's alive? asks the box. Also sounded a bit like THE SIXTH SENSE (is she a ghost and doesn't know it?) And a bit like CARNIVAL OF SOULS (are other ghosts trying to pull her back).All fine films, unlike this crud. SOUL SURVIVORS was a boring mess. After the accident, the girl grieves her dead boyfriend, and is stalked by supernatural hoodlum types. At one point, midway through the film, I thought, "You know, these supernatural hoodlums are kinda like those demon-things stalking the still-dying Tim Robbins in JACOB's LADDER. I suppose the girl could still be dying in the car accident, and she's imagining all this ... Naw, that'd be a real lame ripoff. I'm sure the filmmaker is more original than that." NOT! Yes, this film turns out to be JACOB'S LADDER in FINAL DESTINATION packaging. Except JACOB'S LADDER was creepier, more atmospheric, darker, and had a stronger ending.
Rating: Summary: Soul Searching Review: What is billed as a horror film, in the vein of other late 90's, early 21st century examples such as Scream and I Know What You Did Last Summer, Soul Survivors is anything but. And I don't mean that as a compliment. Adding insult to my expectations: I was initially compelled to watch the film, due to my not so secret crush over Eliza Dushku, and she's hardly in it. The film is a mess.
After surviving a car crash that killed her boyfriend Sean(Ben's younger brother Casey Affleck), Cassandra (Melissa Sagemiller) finds herself haunted by his ghost and frigtening images. While a priest named Jude (Luke Wilson) tries to exorcize these frightful visions from Cassandra's mind, her college friends, former boyfriend Matt (Wes Bently) and Annabel (Dushku) try to help her make sense of what's going on.
I wish somebody were there to help me make sense of this film. Written and directed by Steve Carpenter, the film has an interesting enough set up, but then goes nowhere. I think Carpenter was so intent on throwing viewers off the track with misdirection, he forgot to make sure at least some of the story made sense. The film is not at all scary or thrilling. Sagemiller does an ok job as the person in harm's way with the screaming and running thing. Too bad everyone else and their talents are wasted as underwritten characters. It's a good thing that all of them have gone on to better films after this. As far as "the Killer Cut" is concerned: While I never saw the theatrical version, the promise of more is overhyped, at 85 minutes the film doesn't have much to it. Somehow though, it still seems to take forever, to get us nowhere in the end.
The DVD extras offer no help in trying to figure things out. The few deleted scenes offer just snipets of repetetive dialogue and action. Actress Melissa Sagemiller discusses filming for a selected scene audio commentary. I find it more curious that Carpenter didn't do a full blown track with her, as opposed to finding out anything out she had to say. At a mere 5 minutes, "Behind The Deathmask - The Making of Soul Survivors" featurette interviews the cast but that's it. Again, Carpenter is nowhere to be found, hmmn. Getting more time than everything else is a student made profile on a band that appears briefly in the movie. The student, whose name escapes me, got a D- on the assignment. I say who cares. 2 theatrical trailers, production notes, animated storyboards and a few trailers for other studio releases, round out the disc.
What a disappointment! Soul Survivors is a total mishmash that has no follow through. Cut and paste does no good. Fans of Dushku and horror will be sorry they ever bothered
Rating: Summary: A Mess of a Movie Review: I found this movie to be virtually impossible to follow, the actors two dimensional, and even after the movie ended I still couldn't make any sense of it. I hung in there until the end hoping that it would at one point suddenly come to make sense like "The Butterfly Effect" did for example, but with "Soul Survivors" this simply never happened.
Rating: Summary: Confusing, but still good. Review: If you watch this movie more than 2 times, you will understand it for sure. It's a bit confuse, you actually don't know who is dead, who is alive, in which year they are, but if you watch it a couple of times paying more attention it just gets perfect. Actually, I just bought this movie because of Eliza Dushku.
Rating: Summary: A yawn fest of annoyancy..pure stupidity Review: 4 teenagers get into a horrific car crash and one of them ends up dead or does he? Soon after the 3 "soul survivors" start to act weird and see things and in the end you dont care if they live or if they are dead because it seems like this was written on a piece of toilet paper. the fact is, is that its another one of those corny slasher and mystery pics that everyone craps out once or 5 times in a year, its boring with its lead actress Melissa Sagemiller who screams, runs and who has the acting ability of a turnip. a good supporting cast is wasted with Wes Bently (The Claim, American Beauty), Casey Affleck (Oceans 11 and 12), Luke Wilson (Bottle Rocket, Old School) and Eliza Dushku (Tv's Angel and Buffy The Vampire Slayer) who barely do anything and have no juice. If you really wanna see Dushku and Sagemiller in the shower this is the ticket for you. A waste of good talent. purely for those idiots who like these kind of movies and if you wanna try suspense thrillers, check out Se7en or any of the Scream movies because they had taste. Also starring Angela Featherstone who has a steamy scene with Dushku as well..in the library and they are keeping it quiet.
Rating: Summary: You're in Trouble... Review: This is a film that doesn't really know what it wants to be. I thought it was a horror movie going into it, then while watching it, it looked like it was becoming a slasher flick, but then it switched gears and become some kind of weird supernatural thing, and then it switched gears again, back to the slasher genre, I think, then it...yeah. Let's just say the movie's all over the place and it gets to to the point where you have no idea what's going on, nor do you care.
A young woman and her boyfriend get into a car accident, and he dies. Or does he? Oooooo.... Then she has hallucinations of weird men in masks chasing after her, trying to kill her. Her friends think she's losing her mind, and then it goes on like this until the end, which by the way made NO SENSE! I watched the whole thing thinking it was going to be resolved and then Bam---over. It has this elaborate twist ending that's supposed to shock you, but since you have no idea what the hell's going on, you are left confused. Skip this mess.
Rating: Summary: Melissa is great, forget the rest Review: This movie is worth seeing due to the lead actress Melissa Sagemiller. The plot is very promising. Cassie (Melissa) and three of her friends are in a car crash early in the film. It appears Cassie's boyfriend died, while her other two friends survived. But as the movie goes on, you're not so sure. This movie had such potential, it could have been much better. But Melissa is in nearly every scene and has the talent and charisma to elevate what would otherwise be a really bad movie. And she's gorgeous too. Three stars. Scratch one star for the often incoherent plot, and scratch another for that brown haired girl. She is the movie's biggest liability. Atrocious acting, one note cliche character. She's just awful. Melissa deserved to star in a better film.
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