H13: Playback the Final Destination

Hi all,

The Halloween 13 marathon continues with not one, but two more scary movies! The first is a really obscure film from only last year called Playback. I was doing a bit of research on it and learnt that it was the lowest grossing movie of last year, playing in only one cinema and selling only about 33 tickets. Still, it was sitting at the library so here it is reviewed for your reading pleasure. The second film is 2000's Final Destination, a truly iconic and well-regarded horror movie. A really scary movie it grossed $53 million and spawned 4 sequels. That's how you do a successful horror movie. Oh, and in response to yesterday's reader comment; I also experience horror movie regret, particularly because I always decide to put them on when its midnight and raining. A Tale Of Two Sisters still haunts me, but that's why I love them. Being scared is fun! :)

Thanks,

James

 Playback

2012, USA, Directed by Michael A. Nickles

 I don’t think I could have picked a more different film to form the second part of this marathon. Playback is a new film only about a year or two old and it’s exactly the type of film that I was complaining about in my discussion of Patrick. It’s incredibly violent with a horrific opening. As I sat down at midnight to watch this movie (yeah, that was a really good idea), I was literally disgusted and tempted to turn it off. It was only because I knew that it was forming part of this marathon that I continued. And like many modern horror movies the blood and gore is incredibly over-the-top and truly nasty (there’s a murder involving a pole going through someone’s eye and we’re spared none of the horrific visuals). Add to that a whole lot of unnecessary teenage female nudity, a paedophile policeman and the Devil and that’s basically the entire movie. There’s a few neat little twists, but I guessed those early on and a couple of scary moments, but they’re not oh-my-God,-I’m-not-going-to-be-sleeping-tonight scares. The use of a classic film is an interesting idea (and one that almost seems believable) but ultimately this horror movie fails because it just feels really mundane. It’s not stylish or clever. It’s violent, pointless and unmemorable. Even now, writing this review the day after I’m struggling to remember it. Just really average.

Gore/Violence: 4 (blood gushes, guts come out, heads explode, brains come out the back of heads, it’s a violent, gory movie)
Sex/Nudity: 3 (lots of breasts)

Scares: 3 (scarier than Patrick, but not by much)

Best Scene: Oh my God, that’s what happened to the baby!

Overall Verdict: 6

There’s no reason to cry. This is destiny. And you get to be a part of it.

- Quinn, Playback

 Final Destination

1997, USA, Directed by James Wong

 

 

Now that’s more like it! Final Destination is truly scary, stylish and an incredible demonstration of what the horror genre is capable of when it pulls its socks up. This was a film franchise I’d heard quite a bit about due to my brother’s obsession with it (the one with the car pile-up I’ve seen over 10 times), but I’d never really sat down and given it the time of day. I thought it was a stupid series of horror movies just like any other. I was wrong. This is a truly scary and intelligent horror movie examining fate and death and how we can change when we die. The very best horror movies deal with primal fears; of monsters, of rapists, of senseless murderers but, most of all, of death. There is no greater fear than death and our inability to control when it happens to us. It is this primal fear that gives Final Destination a really frightening edge. It’s also got some of the most inventive death scenes ever put to film as natural objects and incidents combine to create some truly spectacular murders. What’s great about these is that we feel fearful over one aspect of the murder, not realising that it’s all coming together. It’s genius. Also, this movie features almost no nudity or sex and the violence/gore is actually related to the story. Add to that is the supercool climax and creepy ending, suggestive of our inability to escape destiny and it becomes a truly unnerving horror movie experience. It’s because of films like this that the horror genre is so popular.

 

 Gore/Violence: 3 (blood causes accidents, a head gets cut in half)
Sex/Nudity: 1 (one naked Penthouse photo)

Scares: 4 (truly, utterly, terrifying)

Best Scene: Train murder.

Overall Verdict: 9

 

In death, there are no accidents, no coincidences, no mishaps and no escapes. What you have to realize is we’re all just a mouse a cat has by the tail. Every single move we make, from the mundane to the monumental, the red light that we stop at or run, the people we have sex with or won’t with us, aeroplanes that we ride or walk out of, it’s all part of death’s sadistic design, leading to the grave.

- The Mortician, Final Destination