YOU'RE NEXT! GET THE F*** AWAY FROM ME! (Final Destination (DVD))

Name: nathaninnit

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Product:	Final Destination (DVD)
Date:	11/01/08 (58 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Panicing characters making stupid decisions, great entertainment

Disadvantages: You won't watch it over and over, not on the same weekend anyway

*INTELLIGENT HORROR FOR THE NEW MILLENNIUM
Using the word intelligent very lightly, Final Destination opened up a new franchise where the scares were based off no physical being, but the idea that Death was finally coming from the usually young souls he required to carry out his plan. That plan is nothing more than the circle of life, and we're not talking Lion King here, more people dying just being a fact of life - and sometimes it is tragic situations where people have not been given the chance to even get a start on the many things they dreamt of doing. This non-traditional horror was released in 2000, at the very dawn of a thousand years that will no doubtedly be nothing like the 1000 before it. So with the Scream franchise reaching its trilogy climax in the same year as this release, was the world really ready for an all new kind of horror franchise?

*I SAW IT, I SAW THE PLANE...
My first experience with the movie must have came around four years after its actual release, perhaps I had been living under a stone until it was introduced to me in DVD form as the movie we would be studying as part of my GCSE coursework. I know what some of you maybe thinking, interesting pick as there sure isn't that many levels to discuss this 'masterpiece' on. The opening sequence is kind of spooky in its own little way, with the music score accompanying it doing everything in its power to scare you just as it does throughout the film. To be honest, in Final Destination you are never really going to be scared as you know what is coming. There isn't exactly the same jumps as you get in Scream, where someone sneaks up on the hero of the movie, only for it to be her friend.. and then the real killer turns up two seconds later when it's all too late to react.

Alex Browning (Devon Sawa) is preparing for his school trip to France, and if you've never seen a Final Destination film before, which no one had at the point this was released, you may find it pretty weird the way they build up to the big introduction to what the film is actually about. When I say weird, I don't say it in a captivating way, but I suppose the little touches like Alex hoping to keep a tag on his suitcase from a previous flight as it would be a good omen he could get through this flight, and then that tag being removed, are the few 'intelligent' touches to the movie I mentioned at the start. I think to truly accept the movie you do have to be somewhat open to science fiction, because whilst in normal horror movies you can accept that the killers are physical and do stupid things, in this movie the characters are being set-up to be murdered by Death, or in sense 'God', so I suppose you have to be open to the thinking that there maybe something greater than science somewhere.
To keep the movie interesting to a teen audiance, they throw in touches of comedy such as where Alex and his friend Tod (Chad Donella) go sit on the toilet before being called to the gate for boarding so that they will not have to use the aeroplane toilet and quite possibly cause a stink infront of potentially goodlooking girls that they will have to share the plane, and air with, for nine or so hours. Boarding the plane they quickly give you an insight to each of the characters and to what highschool groups they actually belong, and then it's time for a sweaty Alex to fasten his seatbelt and get ready for a plane ride that hopefully he shall be completely wrong about - even with further bad omens such as the table on the chair infront of him falling down. The flight goes off, and they all celebrate, and things are great.. but then of course things completely fall apart just as Alex expected. We have people being sucked out of the plane as it falls apart in the air and then all of them are engulfed in the flames.

Of course that isn't the end of the movie right there, because suddenly Alex wakes up.. true to Final Destination rules the main character sees the accident happen (giving us a good action scene) and then gets to stop as many people as he can from actually being a part of the accident. Pursuading people you have just seen the future isn't exactly easy though. Even sweatier than before, Alex shouts out about how the plane is going to explode and security take him off the plane. This causes Alex to have an argument with jock Carter (Kerr Smith), who is then also pulled off the flight along with his girlfriend Terry (Amanda Detmer). Tod goes along to aid Alex, whilst Tod's brother remains on the flight. Seeing everything go on, Clear (Ali Larter) decides to get off the plane as well. With all the commotion going on, Billy (Seann William Scott) has also got taken off the flight and are told by security that no one that has got off is getting back on. Ms. Valerie Lewton (Kristen Cloke) then bargains with the security that one teacher should get back on the flight to watch the school kids, to which she then sends her male colleague back on to the plane.
*FROM HERO TO ZERO

With seven survivors, that is what makes up the interesting section of the story as we see them all beginning to get knocked off one-by-one, so the fear of never having a death due to missing your first one is not something you'll have to worry about as Death is coming for you sooner than you'd think. All the survivors briefly get questioned by the FBI, as a situation like this has never occured before, and of course Alex has immediately gone from being a hero to being a terrorist suspect and an absolute freak in the eyes of the lives he saved from sure oblitiration in the sky. The investigation into Alex is the interesting part of the film really, although perhaps sometimes frustrating, as there is no real explination to why Alex got the ultimate in deja vu experiences.
The death scenes are all quite creatively done, but of course in an over the top way, I won't go into an explination of exactly who lives and who dies but I will use Tod as the example as he is the one to get caught by Death first. Whilst the ways in which Death gets back at his victims changes over the three films, as I will hopefully introduce you to over a series of reviews, as Death comes for many of his victims in this the original movie you usually see some sort of dark 'scary' shadow similar to that of which a demon would usually be represented on-screen. The wind seems to pick up as well, so that Death can use mother nature in his plan to knock things over. Finally, water seems to be able to come from nowhere, and whilst we get teased by possible death situations such as Tod cutting himself shaving, his ultimate death will come as he slips and gets strangled in the bath by the line drying his clothes. This is a slightly painful death to watch, but if you can see it coming you might be able to find a way to laugh. With the water disappearing back into the now not leaking toilet, it is very convinent that people believe Tod committed suicide over the guilt of him living as his brother dying, and that is exactly the 'lies' that Tod's father feeds down Alex's throat. With Alex also turning up at a lot of the murder scenes, it opens up questions to the FBI that perhaps he did save their lives on the plane by some strange coincidence, but now he is trying to take them. The film could reach out to you on so many levels, if it had actually completed the levels it tried to introduce you to.

What the FBI struggle to understand most, is why Clear decided to leave the plane when she had no real reason like the rest that did. We soon find out that she may not have seen what Alex saw, but she felt it, and her character quickly becomes as mysterious as her name Clear Rivers. I would also like to mention that you may recognise Clear's voice as that of Niki in 'Heroes', because physically you will not be able to recognise her. Obviously growing up treated someone really, really well. Stop it, Nathan. As the one person to really believe Alex, these two align themselves together, although begrudgingly and Alex soon discovers a pattern to the deaths. This is just how in future Final Destination movies there always seems to be clues that can help try and stop them having to die, including the introduction of peoples deaths getting skipped and going on to the next person in the plan. Valerie Newton is racked with guilt and wants nothing to do with Alex, whilst Billy adds comic relief to the movie in the way that he sees Alex as some sort of psychic. Well, it would have been a surprise if Billy did not end up being a side-splitting character as being played by William Scott you would expect exactly that. The real attention is on how Carter and Terry will come around, as they are clearly from a different social standard that does not associate with Alex, comments like, "I wish you were on that plane," as it explodes shattering the airport windows does not help his cause that is a completely innocent bystander.
*WE ALL GO A LITTLE CRAZY

What if this is all in their heads, and these deaths are just freak accidents, the idea of fighting and then speaking to someone that they believe is trying to kill them but can't actually be seen is definitly wearing on the minds of these youngsters, and it's enough to wind viewers up as well. Whilst it does become interesting where the next death is coming from, this is not the best horror you will ever see, and is more a teenage hit movie and that is why I think there is room to bring out so many of these movies. I don't hear any plans for a Final Destination 4 yet, but by throwing in some swearing and sex to the violence of these movies they are able to make this franchise as sellable as hot cakes.
I wouldn't touch any of those cakes whilst they're hot though, not if you've just got out of a burning building.

Summary: After seeing Ali, I just want to watch Heroes again. Mmm..