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jonah116
Reviews
Final Destination 3 (2006)
James Wongs return breathes life into the franchise
For the uninitiated, the Final Destination trilogy has built itself on a simple yet very clever premise: A group of high school students are saved from a tragic event by the premonition of one of their peers, then one by one they are systematically killed off in increasingly elaborate and gory ways, the only way to survive is to try and beat 'deaths plan'.
Writer and Director James Wong returns to the franchise after skipping the second installment and sets the tone early with a foreboding sequence at a theme park where our protagonist imagines the roller-coaster going up in a ball of flames and in her panic, drags seven of her school mates off the doomed ride.
Of course the roller coaster does indeed go haywire, killing all the occupants, and now the ball is ready to roll as 'death' looks to catch up on those that escaped his clutches and exact his painful revenge in the order they were seated on the ride.
Yes, a contrived beginning, but who cares? Here comes the fun.
Final Destination is about the elaborate and messy kills, each one out doing the other and part three does not disappoint.
My personal favorites are the two materialistic teen queens who suffer a nasty fate in a tanning salon and the obligatory Gothic character who cops a mouthful of nail-gun in a hardware store.
Maybe it all sounds so obvious, and possibly it is, but the tense and clever build up to every kill makes it worthwhile and the pay off will satisfy all you gore-hounds out there.
Stickmen (2001)
Primo Script,Good Characters,Stylish Looking....
After watching a few trashy NZ films its great to see a totally entertaining and fresh flick which keeps you guessing,laughing and enthralled from start to finish. Bassically 3 kiwi guys are thrust into a high stakes pool tournament, were they play a bevy of different and interesting characters every round,throw in a couple of chicks, and underworld King Pin"Daddy" and his lakeys and you have the formula for stickmen. Add to the mix a few interesting Sub plots/Diversions-The guy who works as a driver for escorts, the guy with the pink shirt etc, and you have the freshest film to come out of New Zealand since the days of Brain Dead and Once Were Warriors.