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When I first started this blog, I stated that it would contain reviews as well as my general outlook on the movie industry. I have had a few ideas for these Rants in the past, but none that I could really formulate into a solid article. So here's the first of hopefully many Movie Rants...
I am a firm believer in the Retro Rule of 20, of which I have mentioned in my G.I. Joe review. It's a simple rule that the media of today will reflect back fondly upon the days of twenty years ago. The idea is that the now late twenty early 30 somethings who grew up in those days who now have more expendable income than when they were 10 will flock to these properties like they did when they were kids, and generally they do.
The evidence isn't hard to see from the 2000's, with G.I. Joes, Transformers, animated shows like Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles and He-Man being remade, and even a (somewhat bad) remake of Knight Rider. And going back further we can see such evidence in The Wonder Years, a 90s look back on the 70s, and Happy Days, a 70s look back on the 50s.
So the new decade is upon us, and a new trend of Retro comes with it. Now, I am a 90s kid... As much as I wish to deny it. I try, truly, to relate to the 80s, but I wasn't even 5 when they ended. No I was raised in the 90s, and man... What an undefined decade. Truly meandering about with nothing to claim for itself.
What can be said about the 90s? Well it birthed the Modern Internet, and lead to the Dot Com boom... Which ended badly. It saw the advent of the modern cell phone... which didn't come to popularity till the 2000's... And it brought us the Dark Age of Comics... And that's all I'll say on that.
So what does this say for our Media? Well it's hard to say... Most Television and Movies coming from the 90s aren't heralded very fondly, with most of it's defining features of entertainment being Video Game related. That's not to be said that the entertainment of the 90s was complete garbage, many great movies and television shows came from this decade... But then most of it simply would not work as a remake or revitalization. It's an interesting time, to be honest... I for one can't wait for the Live Action adaptation of Samurai Pizza Cats...
...And now I feel really old.
The Final Destination
The Final Destination follows the story of Death's latest List Skippers. A group of four sit within the audience of a NASCAR style Stock Car race, one of which loudly admits to only being there in hopes of a crash. The main character Nick has a vision of such a crash, so horrible it kills dozens of people including him and his friends. Distraught, he quickly rushes his friends and a few bystanders out of the Speedway, in which moments later the vision comes true. Shortly after they find that Death is stalking them, picking them off in the order they should have died in during the accident.
Lets get right down to this and not beat around the bush... The Final Destination, as opposed to Final Destination 4, is a gore porn. It serves no real merit as a Horror or Thriller movie. People who follow the series KNOW the characters are going to die, and expect it en mass. Now there's nothing wrong with that, Splatter Spectacles like Hostel or The Hills Have Eyes do a wonderful job of showing you grotesquery and making you squirm in your seat at it. But this?
The movie is littered with bad CGI, scenes that scream "this is supposed to be in 3D", and pretty bland death scenes. I'm not joking, the deaths in this are pretty boring and tame compared to the others save for maybe two. And when you're making such a blatant Spectacle Horror like this, your audience is expecting the absurd.
One thing that personally bugged me was the huge Red Herring in the middle of the movie (there are several red herrings throughout...) Where an entire death scene set up is thrown away with no payoff, only to lead to the actual death scene which is utterly forgettable. This wouldn't be so bad if they hadn't shown a can of hairspray sliding across the counter, moved by death, and then have it accumulate to nothing.
Towards the end of the movie, the story goes so far as to break it's own rules, completely negating the 'order of death' staple the series had had since the beginning in favor of a large climactic end, in which it's best death is used, and then completely negated.
The creators have stated that this is the last Final Destination movie, which implies some sort of culmination, a climax of the entire series as opposed to just another group of people trying to outwit a personified concept. This does come, sort of. It's a quickly uttered and easy to miss line at the climax of the film, a character postulating that maybe everything is Death's design, completely negating the entire point of the entire Final Destination series.
Though do to the success of this film (most likely due to the fact that it was a Gore Porn in 3D) there have been talks of continuing... Though I quite honestly feel the series should have ended shortly before Final Destination 3 went into production.
The Final Destination comes to DVD on the Fifth, it's competent for it's genre and has a few good spectacles, but is completely forgettable with no lasting impression...
