• Movie Review: Wind Chill (2007) – For a Horror Movie, Great Character Buildup, Prehistoric Thrills

    Date: 2009.03.31 | Category: Movies, Reviews | Tags:

    At the moment, I’m posting some old rants, reviews and the likes to my blog. Some of the stuff has just been lying around on different computers and desktops, some of it has been posted online, some has even been banned online (damn that dirty mouth of mine!), but whether it’s interesting or not, well… You be the judge :)

    Here’s one I originally posted on IMDb on July 12, 2007. At the time of writing, it’s still there, but you never know when some “user” will take offense and call it “abuse”, so here it is again:

    This is the kind of movie that gets you to actually register here to voice your dismay.

    Why? Because it has everything going right from the start; blueish, ominous, still (as in grave) footage, something-bad-is-going-to-happen atmos, and a great character and story buildup.

    Problem is, the story being built up is not a horror story, it’s a romantic one, or even a romantic comedy. These people obviously have never understood horror movies, it’s like watching something out of the 70s or early 80s once the “action” gets going. Mix in 21st century character writing and great acting with clichéd and excessively overused and non-scary 70s style horror moments, you’ve got the essence of this movie.

    The story would be great if it were not for the sudden shift from the romantic theme to the horror one. But, then again, this is supposed to be a horror movie. And, if you’re a different kind of screen writer, what do you do? You ask some horror buff about what’s scary, because you’ve got all this storyline built up, but it’s just not scary yet.

    So, the mate says, “put it some ghosts, they’re scary,” and “something about dead people with a vengeance” etc. And the screenwriter just throws those in here and there without any particular contextual attachment or logical reason.

    Also, this is one of those movies that tick you off with the classic “but, hellooo, why don’t they just *****” (asterisks put in to avoid spoiling anything). It’s one of those things where you just hope that someone (without, in this case, knowing who the hell that someone would be) would kill the leading characters just because they act completely foolish and because you just want the thing to end.

    Don’t watch it. I’ve seen much better movies here with a much lower rating. The high rating is entirely for the acting, which is really superb.