maandag 21 april 2014

Death Do Us Part (2014)

Genre : Horror/Thriller
Country : Canada

Cast :
Julia Benson : Kennedy
Peter Benson : Ryan
Emilie Ullerup : Emily

Director :
Nicholas Humphries

Summary
Kennedy Jamieson, a wealthy socialite, has waited her whole life to have the perfect wedding. Engaged to the charming Ryan Harris, the young couple is just a week away from the big day but hasn't had a chance to celebrate their respective bachelor/bachelorette parties. Ryan's best man Chet books a remote cabin in the woods to throw them a 'Jack and Jill' stag that they'll never forget. Out in the middle of nowhere, things take a horrifying turn as members of the group are brutally picked off one by one. What started out as a celebration quickly descends into a bloody nightmare. Friendships are ripped apart and accusations fly in this blood filled psychological horror with a whodunit twist.

My opinion
Sometimes one wonders why he has made the effort to start watching a particular film and how he could think it would be a pleasant time waster. "Death do us part " contains elements of a slasher film and a common mystery movie. But it contains all the worst elements. A group of young people going on stag weekend in a godforsaken place far from civilization . Of course you do that if you want to keep such a party and don`t want anyone to witness the riotous festivities that will erupt there , I suppose. The cheerful couple who are going to give their consent the following week is Kennedy and Ryan. She is apparently the daughter of a wealthy family (with also a mental illness apparently), and he`s some loser who has more to answer for than you may suspect . They are accompanied by the sister Hannah, a good friend Emily , Ryan`s best man Chet and his cousin Derek who also has a rather dark past .

The welcome committee alone would already make me turn around and return to the civilization ASAP. Bo, the owner of the bungalow, is not exactly a paragon of kindness and is quite frightening and threatening. The dead starlings on the porch , he cleans up reluctantly with a spade after he concludes in an intelligent way that they are indeed dead . A terrible way to bring humor in this film , and it gave a good idea what was to follow . What ultimately was the purpose of these dead birds , I couldn´t figure out . An attempt to make it lugubrious and mysterious perhaps? We can´t really talk about performances. It´s more like a failure in performing. The three main female characters were probably selected based on the weight of their breasts. The higher the weight, the more important the role. After a while I was even convinced that their cup-size effortlessly defeated their IQ in numbers. Totally unconvincing , and they looked like members of a youth movement running around in the threatening woods anxious and panicky.

The three male protagonists tried to be tough, except Chet who behaved throughout the film as a drunken fooler. Eventually they behaved like a bunch of sissies who are running back and forth through the woods and at every suspicious noise they react like real cowards. The moment they try to flee by car and they want to check the engine was hilarious. Eventually it becomes a "who-is-now-the-main suspect" game, where you´ll be put on the wrong foot a huge amount of times. Bo is of course suspicious. The guy looks a bit like Lurch from "The Addams Family", and appears every time where you least expect it and saunters around with a dangerous looking ax. Eventually, you may expect a surprising plot and a not so surprising ending. Don´t expect a real massacre. That was really a major disappointment.