Caught this from a movie channel. I don't usually expect much from a low budget horror film, but once in a while there is a gem in between. This ones not a gem. Still, even bad ones are usually worth a look.
The story starts off quite interesting. We have a train accident where a bus full of children get killed and a teenager who is back from rehab starts getting messages from the dead. The bus crash in the beginning is indeed horrific and the fact that the leading actress is back from rehab after od'ing from hard drugs was new for me. I'm guessing the fact that she was dead for a while should have had more meaning on the story (think of Flatliners), but she didn't seem the only one who got clues from the dead.
The acting is not bad, it's actually quite good. Some of the characters are annoying, but the performances are pretty good if you consider the rest of the movie. Surprisingly, by far the worst performance comes from Lou Diamond Phillips. Scenes with him alone are downright cringe worthy.
The movie is a mixture of a ghost story and a slasher and it doesn't seem to know which one it eventually is. The slasher part doesn't work, at least to me the victims seemed pretty random, but I may not have been too sharp while watching. Also people didn't seem to care that their fellow students have gone missing, or if teachers were getting slaughtered in their office. As a ghost story it's better, but still does not deliver. It just lacks the logic of a well unfolding story and the "twist" in the end is not very memorable.
There are lots of small goofs or other details that distracted me. Would anyone have his ex-wife named "ex-wife" on his cellphone, for any other reason than for the audience to know the ex- wife is calling? Also the very ending, I don't know if you could call it an epilogue, is somewhat out of tune with the rest of the movie.
It's worth mentioning that this is the first horror movie I've seen to use a type face similar to comic sans in the opening credits!
The story starts off quite interesting. We have a train accident where a bus full of children get killed and a teenager who is back from rehab starts getting messages from the dead. The bus crash in the beginning is indeed horrific and the fact that the leading actress is back from rehab after od'ing from hard drugs was new for me. I'm guessing the fact that she was dead for a while should have had more meaning on the story (think of Flatliners), but she didn't seem the only one who got clues from the dead.
The acting is not bad, it's actually quite good. Some of the characters are annoying, but the performances are pretty good if you consider the rest of the movie. Surprisingly, by far the worst performance comes from Lou Diamond Phillips. Scenes with him alone are downright cringe worthy.
The movie is a mixture of a ghost story and a slasher and it doesn't seem to know which one it eventually is. The slasher part doesn't work, at least to me the victims seemed pretty random, but I may not have been too sharp while watching. Also people didn't seem to care that their fellow students have gone missing, or if teachers were getting slaughtered in their office. As a ghost story it's better, but still does not deliver. It just lacks the logic of a well unfolding story and the "twist" in the end is not very memorable.
There are lots of small goofs or other details that distracted me. Would anyone have his ex-wife named "ex-wife" on his cellphone, for any other reason than for the audience to know the ex- wife is calling? Also the very ending, I don't know if you could call it an epilogue, is somewhat out of tune with the rest of the movie.
It's worth mentioning that this is the first horror movie I've seen to use a type face similar to comic sans in the opening credits!