MOVIE REVIEW

Final Destination  (2000)

Starring: Devon Sawa, Ali Larter, Kerr Smith
Director: James Wong
Rating: R

Studio: New Line Cinema

Review Posted: 2.10.01

Reviewed by Dennis Landmann

"Nothing is final until the end"

Final Destination is a fine thriller with surprises out of nowhere, twists here and there, and scares throughout. This movie doesn't borrow, but rather relies on elements that made The Sixth Sense and Scream so successful. Final Destination is from first-time director James Wong who also co-wrote the script with Glen Morgan (both wrote some X-Files episodes), and Jeffrey Reddick.

Alex Browning (Devon Sawa) appears to be the average high-school student when in fact he is everything but. He has visions. His first vision is that the airplane he and his French class are boarding is going to blow up. He demands to get off the plane, but class jock Carter (Kerr Smith) starts a fight with Alex. His girl-friend Terry (Amanda Detmer) and some other students try to separate them which immediately gets them escorted off the plane. Alex's friend Tod (Chad Donella), the mysterious Clear Rivers (Ali Larter), teacher Valerie Lewton (Kristen Cloke), Billy (Seann William Scott), Carter, and Terry are left at the airport. Just after another fight between Alex and Carter, all of them witness the explosion of the plane and subsequently are shocked into silence.

Alex and his friends have cheated death by not dying in the explosion. There are no accidents in death, no coincidences, no escapes. The killer of this film is Death and he starts to kill off each survivor, one at a time.

One outstanding element in this movie is the great depth of the death scenes. They were much more elaborate and original than other teen horror films that simply spray blood (i.e. Scream, Urban Legends, I Know What You Did Last Summer). Give this movie an award for best deaths. I'm not joking when I say this because how often do you get to see a bus literally dismantling a person? (hardly the same in Meet Joe Black) Some problems with this movie are that the actors playing 17-year-olds are just not believable, for they look a bit old and too perfect (movies have never succeeded at this so why should this one even try). There's a scene in which Alex and Clear break into the mortuary. Just by seeing how easy they got in, it's unbelievable.

The good thing about this movie is the visual mind of director James Wong. He knows where to insert a scare or death sequence when the audience least expects it. The filmmakers could have done better with the ending because it wasn’t that great (a last-minute re-shoot in January took place in Canada, which had to substitute for Paris). The old ending was probably better than the one in the final film, but my guess is that New Line was afraid to displease the audience.

This is not a wait-till-video movie because one becomes scared more easily in a dark theatre than at home where there's always that little light. So go out and get scared. It'll pay off. Final Destination keeps you high on your toes for 93 minutes.

Film Rating: 7/10