So I saw The Final Destination in 3-D last night. To write a detailed review examining all of its many shortcomings would be a waste of my time and yours ("oh, really, Trevor? You say the fourth Final Destination wasn't that good? What a surprise!"), so I'll skip it. Instead, here are just random thoughts about the movie.
- First off, it was predictably awful, but it was also fun seeing it in the theater. I don't regret going. If I hadn't, I would have ended up catching it on cable some day and thinking "well, that was crappy...I wish I had at least watched it in 3-D." So, now I did, and I never have to watch it again. That being said, it's the first Final Destination movie that I never will watch again, so it was definitely a big step-down in quality from the previous entries.
- This had to be one of the worst scripts ever....EVER. Every bit of dialogue just rang so false. It was as if they hired an alien to write it. "Just write it the way you think humans actually talk, Zurg."
- Even if the script had been better, it wouldn't have mattered, as the cast was pretty pathetic. None of the four leads had any chemistry with one another. Scratch that - they just didn't have any chemistry at all. Even Justin Welborn, an actor whose work I've really enjoyed in films like The Signal and Dance of the Dead, was terrible here. Of course, he wasn't done any favors by the fact that he was playing a one-note character credited as "Racist." No, really, that's his character's name - "Racist."Other characters included Mechanic, MILF, and Mechanic's Girlfriend.
- Speaking of MILF, she was played by the gorgeous Krista Allen, and I would like to thank The Final Destination for reminding me of her. I haven't thought about Krista Allen in years (probably since the underrated HBO series Unscripted), but watching this movie made me wish Cinemax would start re-showing Emmanuelle in Space again.
- There was one decent actor in this - Mykelti Williamson, who brought far more charisma and dignity to his role than this movie - nay, this franchise deserved.
- This was the second movie in a row that I've seen stage it's big climax in a movie theater. This one wasnt quite as good as Inglourious Basterds.
- Speaking of that climax, this was the first time I remember in a Final Destination movie that one of the "accidents" meant for the main characters also ended up killing dozens of innocent victims, who had nothing to do with the original tragedy our heroes escaped. I guess it took four movies, but Death is finally pissed.
- Also, the movie the characters are seeing is in 3-D. When we see the screen they are watching, we don't see the movie in 3-D. Instead, we see the blurry image that you see when take off your glasses during a 3-D movie. I'll admit that was kind of a clever touch. But I really wish they hadn't had all the extras playing the audience members reacting to the 3-D the way audience members always react in commercials for 3-D. Whenever you go to a 3-D movie, you might see one or two people who are still dumb enough to flinch at 3-D effects, but you never see the entire theater doing it. Since they presented it that way here, it totally took me out of the reality of the movie...and yes, I realize I'm saying that about The Final Destination.
- Yes, there were some pretty cool deaths...but they are all in the first half of the film. It seems like by the mid-point, the screenwriters were just too bored to keep coming up with anything interesting, and were content to just start dropping things on people. They even sunk as low as to simply recreate a death from the first movie - although they did make it nice wink-wink moment by having the character talking about "deja vu" seconds before it happens.
- You ever read the short story "Guts," by Chuck Palahniuk? Yeah, so have the writers of The Final Destination.
- It must suck to live in the Final Destination universe, where every single building and room you enter is just fraught with imminent peril. The surprise isn't that death can get to these characters, it's that they weren't already dead by the age of two. Still, as goofy as it all seems, I have to admit that after watching one of these I always end up looking around the rooms I'm in, trying to figure out what kind of Rube Goldberg hijinks death could conjure up if it wanted to take me out.
- Unless my memory is failing me, I think this was the first FD movie in which the main character has a vision not only of the initial tragedy, but then continues to have visions of each subsequent death before they happen. This actually made me realize that there is still an intriguing Final Destination movie to be made. I would love to see a movie that finally examines the mythology of the series, because there is something interesting going on here. What exactly is giving characters these visions? Is there some ulterior force opposed to death, that is trying to give these people a fighting chance? Or does death just do this itself, whenever it gets bored and wants to make things a little more sporting. I realize they will never actually make a FD movie that looks into this, since it doesn't fit into their plan to just keep re-doing the same formula over and over, but I would definitely be down for seeing it (or writing it, if New Line wants to give me a call).
- Where the hell was Tony Todd?? At least FD3 used his voice.
- Finally, I noticed that The Final Destination was directed by David R. Ellis, who also directed Final Destination 2 and Cellular. But, more importantly, he also directed Snakes on a Plane, and holy shit, do you realize that if they had just waited a couple more years to make that movie, we probably would have had Snakes on a Plane in 3-D!! That would have been awesome, and it might have even helped SoaP turn a bigger profit than it did.
