Final Destination 5.

Just about everybody knows the plot of the Final Destination movies, and that's because they're all the same. However, for some reason, they are still highly entertaining and widely watched as the writers introduces more and more gruesome ways in which for the characters to die. I believe the reason Final Destination movies are so terrifying is because they turn perfectly normal, day to day objects or events into murder weapons. Whilst the deaths are highly improbable, they are not impossible, and so these movies still retain a sense of realism which is what makes the audience tick.

This time, Death is after a group of co-workers who are saved from dying on a collapsing bridge when Sam Lawton has a premonition of the event before it happens. Of course, this group was never meant to survive and they're about to picked off one by one, in the most unsuspecting manner, unless if they can figure out a way to save themselves and evade Death.


I recognised many of the actors cast in Final Destination 5; however, none of them were of great enough recognition for me to actually remember any of their names. Miles Fisher, who has an uncanny likeness to Tom Cruise, played his smarmy, agitated, 'boss' role perfectly, and I love it when characters like him get killed off because there's a certain feel of 'he had it coming'. The main character, Sam, is played by Nicholas D'Agosto, who encapsulates his role as someone who is perfectly sane despite what he says is insane. He has quite an innocent appearance and so you greatly sympathise with him and the troubles thrust upon him. As in all Final Destination films, many of the characters are incredibly annoying, especially as they realise that it's every man for himself in the face of Death. It takes a certain skill to act an annoying, self absorbed, dense character without over doing it so I think the cast was made up of some pretty talented actors.

Unfortunately, I didn't get the chance to watch this in cinemas in 3D; however, it was fairly obvious to me that it would've looked great in cinemas as certain shots were spectacularly disgusting. I'm quite a big horror movie fan; however, some of the scenes in this movie made me flinch and squirm, so this definitely isn't one for the squeamish or faint-hearted! I think the CGI animator deserves a round of applause for making the blood look realistic because it is so easy for horror films to turn into comedies because of poor use of CGI which ultimately results in what I like to call, the Ketchup effect.


Whilst the latest instalment of the Final Destination series is 'number 5', it is in fact, a prequel to the first Final Destination movie made. This was probably the best and worse part of this movie for me. I was absolutely mind blown when I found this out, firstly because it was quite surprising and there was nothing to suggest this at any point during the movie, secondly, because something about it just didn't add up. That night, my friend and I stayed up until 3a.m. trying to figure out how on earth this could possibly be the 'first' Final Destination movie given that the characters seemed to have heard of events similar to theirs already. But how could this be possible if this was the 'first' movie?! I still haven't figured this out. There was also an unexplained figure who frequently appeared to warn the characters of Death. His appearance and disappearance was never explained properly and his character just confused me - I still haven't figured out who he was either.


Personally, I feel that this was the best out of the Final Destination movies. The screenplay was fantastic with realistic shots of blood flying everywhere. The ways the characters died were original and scarier than ever because prior to watching this one probably wouldn't think these things were even dangerous.  I'd definitely recommend this if you've watched the others and liked them, and also if you're a horror movie fan. You don't need to have watched the previous movies to understand this one as they are all stand-alone films.

Warning: Prepare for what you thought was normal and safe to be destroyed.

Fright Night.


Finally. A supernatural movie in which the vampires are supposed to scare you, not dazzle you with their sparkling skin. Admittedly, whilst the trailer for Fright Night looked really great, I thought the actual movie was going to be really bad. The still adverts made it look like it was going to a be a typical teen horror movie where a crazy psycho, in this case, a vampire, moves in next door, but nobody believes the teenagers because the neighbour is just so god-damn charming. Surprisingly, Fright Night was nothing like that. Though I suppose I should've known that it was going to be really good, I mean, David Tennant is in it.



For those of you who haven't seen the 1985 original, Fright Night is basically about a teenager called Charlie and what happens after a seemingly charming vampire, Jerry - yes, Jerry the vampire - moves in next door. Charlie's classmates start mysteriously disappearing from school and so Charlie is forced into investigating these disappearances by his ex-best friend, Ed Lee (Christopher Mintz-Plasse). He soon discovers that Ed was right and Jerry is a vampire and worried that Jerry may have set his sights on his own mother, Charlie seeks help from the 'vampire slayer', Peter Vincent (David Tennant). It's not long before Jerry realises that Charlie knows his secret and let's just say, he wasn't very happy about this. That's a very brief synopsis because there are so many unexpected twists and turns and I don't want to ruin the plot.

After watching Fright Night, I'm certain that I've been paying too much attention in my English lessons as every five seconds I was saying to myself 'ooh, that creates a sense of foreboding'. There were certain things about this movie that was so subtle and so clever and they made this film a success. I don't want to give away exactly what these things are, but I recommend you pay extra attention to what programme the television is showing when it is on and what happens in the video that Charlie watches. The use of technology in the background, dare I say it, created a strong sense of foreboding and hints at what's to come.

David Tennant really can play any role

Charley's girlfriend turns nasty.

The soundtrack was truly excellent, which really surprised me. It was the music that got me frightened right at the very beginning and it does an great job at mediating your mood throughout the film. I don't know how they managed to do this, but at one point, I even started to feel hotter, just .... Another thing which surprised me, was excellent camera work. I don't think I've ever noticed camera work whilst watching a movie, but there really were some excellent shots in this. They weren't necessarily panoramic views (though there are plenty of those), sometimes they were really subtle things, but camera managed to capture each scene from the perfect angle.

Part of what made Fright Night a success was the great cast. The majority of the cast were actors of note and if not I still recognised them from one movie or another. I have to say that although I don't really like Colin Farrell as an actor, I think he made an excellent vampire - Farrell fans will be pleased to know that he seems to have worked out for the role. Anton Yelchin played Charley Brewster the main character and although I don't believe I've seen him in any movies before he's actually been in quite a lot. Academy-award nominated Toni Collette plays the mother of Charley, though she doesn't have a very large role in this film. David Tennant isn't as involved in the movie as I would've liked; however, his prescenece in the second half of the film definitely did a lot for this movie.

Definitely been working out...

One criticism of this movie is that whilst the majority of the drama and horror looked realistic, the spurting blood really did not. It was obvious that these scenes would've looked a lot better in 3D and I imagine they were pretty spectacular; however, I was only watching it in 2D and it looked like red plasma, not blood. The blood looked fine when it was just trickling or lying still, but as soon as it started spurting it began to look computer generated.

Fright Night was a lot better than I was expecting it to be and it instilled a sense of fear in me right from the onset with it's dramatic and bloody beginning. It's defined as a 'comedy horror' film and I guess that would be about right since there are some horrifying moments and others when I just wanted to laugh out loud. This definitely isn't a movie for squeamish people or people that get frightened easily. I have almost become immune to the frights of horror movies and I still found myself gasping at a couple of points during the film. I guess this would mostly appeal to teenage boys there's no reason why girls who enjoy a bit of horror *cough* David Tennant and Colin Farrell *cough* shouldn't enjoy this too.