Movie Appraisal: Dead End (2003)

Ray Wise? I love that guy. My first thought after seeing him was that this movie is going to be awesome.

It actually didn't disappoint at all. I found some scenes to be unintentionally (...I think... It's always hard to tell with these kinds of movies) funny, but besides that this movie is solid horror movie best watched alone in the dead of night.

I personally didn't find it scary except once or maybe even twice and only then with jump scares. It was incredibly easy to see where this plot was going. Maybe I've gotten good at identifying what happens in horror movies of this kind. I'd almost call it psychological horror... but it's not quite that. Almost. Actually, the film reminds me of Reeker (2005), which is incredibly similar, but with much worse acting and much better visuals.

Actually comparing this film to Reeker is quite apt. They seriously are incredibly similar films. If you know the plot of one you've seen the plot of both. They do both have pretty radically different ways going about handling the plot, but the plot is still the same. I'd rather not get into spoilers here for either movie. They're both worth watching, although I will say again that the visuals in Reeker are better, while the acting in Dead End (mostly because of Ray Wise, I have to say) is top notch. It really was a pleasure to watch Ray Wise go off the deep end. Have I mentioned how awesome this guy is? Seriously, if you don't know who Ray Wise is, shame on you. Go watch the entirety of Twin Peaks including Fire Walk With Me this second. No, I'm not even kidding. Stop reading this and go watch that series. You've missed out so badly if you haven't seen it, especially Fire Walk With Me, which I have to say is one of my favorite David Lynch films.

Oh... I think I moved a little off topic. My point is that this is a very decent film, and very short for easy access. I really enjoyed it for what it was. If you haven't liked other movies that I've reviewed and liked, you probably won't like this one either, but if you have liked the other films, check this one out. It's worth it.

I do have to mention the visuals and the ideas just quickly. There are a lot of supposed to be gory scenes in this film, but the camera doesn't really show the gore, which I actually really like. I think it makes the film much better in some ways. These kinds of films usually love to show the gory shots, but this one almost has some class not showing those shots. And the whole idea of "nothing is scarier" is shown pretty awesomely in this film as well. A lot of the "scary" parts really don't show anything at all, they just imply things, which is hard to do effectively, but I feel that this film did pull it off from an artistic perspective if not from a horrific one.