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Whatever you think Dead End might be, I think you'll probably be wrong. The directorial debut of Frenchman Jean-Baptiste Andrea is a curious little thing that plays with your head from start to finish. Part ghost story, part slasher and part science-fiction movie, Dead End feels like a ... Read review
Detective Burt Williams has been on the trail of the infamous Poe Killer for nearly three ... more
years. The most recent abduction of fashion model Heather Makepiece prompts state authorities to bring in the FBI. Burt's daughter Kris Williams, a homicide agent for the FBI, along with her partner Sean Michaels take over. Burt reluctantly steps down from the case and retires. For the next seven months, the Poe Killer continues his murderous rampage, until Kris discovers that the killer uses internet chat rooms to seduce his prey. She logs in as Annabel Lee and sure enough, he contacts her. With the help of Larry, the tech guy, she sets up a meeting at a nearby bowling alley. However, things go wrong, Kris is abducted and her partner Sean is slaughtered.Meanwhile, five graduate students decide to go to the old dead end road for a little partying. It becomes a race against time for Burt and expartner Grace Andrews to save the students and to find Kris before she becomes the next tale in the Poe Killer's book of death.
Production Year: 2004 - Horror - Director: Zack Snyder - Original Language: English - Classification: 18 years and over - Starring: Sarah Polley, Ving Rhames, Jake Weber, Mekhi Phifer
Advantages: Some interesting ideas Disadvantages: Disappointingly dull - predictable ending
...
Whatever you think Dead End might be, I think you'll probably be wrong. The directorial debut of Frenchman Jean-Baptiste Andrea is a curious little thing that plays with your head from start to finish. Part ghost story, part slasher and part science-fiction movie, Dead End feels like a dozen different things all at once but sadly struggles to do or be anything properly.
The obvious conclusion to be drawn from the plot synopsis ... ...is exactly what I thought Dead End was all about. The arrival of The Lady In White feels like the arrival of a survivor from another unfortunate family trip, and it is the realisation that this is not actually the case that first starts to rock the film's foundations. You get the feeling that there is something seriously wrong with this woman, and you know that you really don't want anyone to look at her baby underneath all those blankets. But then, ... more
Frank Harrington and his family are creatures of habit. Every year without fail they make the annual pilgrimage to see Frank's in-laws and every year without fail they get there without any trouble. Joining Frank on this year's trip are his wife Laura, his daughter Marion, Marion's boyfriend Brad and Frank's obnoxious son Richard. It isn't a pleasant trip. His wife nags incessantly. Marion and Brad are barely speaking to one another and Richard is doing his absolute best to wind everybody up. After yet another bout of nagging and bickering, an air of calm descends upon the car and everyone dozes off. The only trouble is that this includes Frank, the driver, and with only inches to spare, he narrowly manages to avoid crashing headlong into an oncoming car.
Bombarded by insults from furious family members, Frank humbly apologises, calms everyone down and eventually sets off again. Unlike previous years, Frank decides to take a slightly different route. Rather than following the highway as normal, Frank takes one of the back roads and the family soon finds itself alone on a mysteriously empty road through the woods.
But the monotony of the woodland is quickly and suddenly broken by a strange figure in the road. A young woman, dressed solely in white is found clutching a baby wrapped in a blanket. The woman is silent and apparently in shock from a serious head injury. The Harringtons help her into the back of the car and then travel quickly back up the highway to a previously spotted log cabin, from where they hope to be able to get help.
What the Harringtons don't realise is that The Lady In White is not what or whom she appears to be and neither needs nor wants their help. Alone in the woods, with nowhere to get help, the family will soon realise the consequence of deviating from the highway. A ghostly black hearse will soon start claiming the night's victims…..
Whatever you think Dead End might be, I think you'll probably be wrong. The directorial debut of Frenchman Jean-Baptiste Andrea is a curious little thing that plays with your head from start to finish. Part ghost story, part slasher and part science-fiction movie, Dead End feels like a dozen different things all at once but sadly struggles to do or be anything properly.
The obvious conclusion to be drawn from the plot synopsis above is that this is one of those films where the good guys wander off into the woods and fall prey to creatures unknown. For the first thirty or forty minutes into the film, this is exactly what I thought Dead End was all about. The arrival of The Lady In White feels like the arrival of a survivor from another unfortunate family trip, and it is the realisation that this is not actually the case that first starts to rock the film's foundations. You get the feeling that there is something seriously wrong with this woman, and you know that you really don't want anyone to look at her baby underneath all those blankets. But then, all hell breaks loose.
And it was at this point that Dead End started to loose my interest. Call me conventional and easily pleased but I LIKED the idea that this was one of those "bad road trip" movies and I was keen to find out what lurked in the woods. Even Andrea's direction seemed to point me in this direction, with some wonderfully spooky aerial shots of the family's car trundling through the depths of the forests, guided only by the car headlights. There can be nothing creepier than a forest at night and I felt sure that I was going to enjoy this film. But I didn't.
For a start, things started to get very silly. Whereas up until this point there had been a gentle black humour throughout the film, the comedy element seemed to be taking up more and more of the screen time. The characters were starting to behave with more and more eccentricity. Events seemed to be making less and less sense and just like the family's trip along the strange road, the film didn't seem to be progressing. The Lady in White would come and go the black hearse would roll up and roll on again and everything started to become more and more desperate without an explanation in sight. And I found this terribly dull. The combination of the plot's lack of direction and the increasingly neurotic characters started to turn me right off. By the time the film had trundled to its conclusion I couldn't really have cared less what was going on.
Don't you hate it when a film has a twist and everyone else says, "Oh, I saw that coming a mile off!" I do. But I'm ashamed to say that I was one of those people. There was a trigger in the film (and I won't say what) that suddenly made me realise exactly what was going on. At this point, I paused the DVD player, turned to my friend and explained exactly what was going to happen next. And it did - not because I'm terribly clever, but because it was the obvious, plausible explanation for what was happening to the Harrington family. With hindsight, it now seems ludicrously simple.
As a horror film, I would say that Dead End is almost completely unsuccessful. For a start, it isn't particularly horrible. Some fairly gruesome deaths are suggested, rather than shown and indeed where dead bodies are concerned, the camera decides to show things from the angle of the unfortunate corpse. This means that although you can see the character looking down and grimacing in revulsion and distress, you can't actually see what has happened to the bodies yourself. In a better, cleverer film, I would have labelled this as a fairly subtle touch. In Dead End, it served only to add to the audience's frustrations. There were a couple of fairly grisly bits that you DID see, but overall these were more for comedy value than horror. As such, the film only attracted a 15 certificate in the UK - and felt more like a 12 to me, to be honest.
Not only is the film not horrible, it also seems to fail on the chills. Despite the potentially terrifying location, the pace and tone of the film is such that you never really seem to appreciate the Harrington family's predicament. Whilst this isn't helped by the fact that they're all as irritating as hell, it isn't helped much by the lack of anything to break the flow of the film and make you jump. The car seems to drive on and on forever. The woods just seem to loom up and pass like a row of military figures. Things don't go from bad to worse. They just stay at bad. This means that the whole peril of the situation doesn't take hold.
As a mystery, Dead End is a little more successful because it has a puzzle that the audience needs to solve. But it isn't a puzzle that is gradually pieced together - you either get it or you don't and then the film's end will spell it out for everyone who fell into the latter category. Enormously, painfully so. The only way that things could have been a little easier to understand would have been subtitles at the bottom of the screen explaining the significance of each item. Hormonal, popcorn-fuelled teenagers would probably have been impressed. Rational adults would probably not.
None of the film's cast was familiar to me from other movies. Ray Wise appears to be fairly well known from the television series Twin Peaks, and as Frank he does his cranky best to portray a normal man gradually sent over the age. His wife, played by Lin Shaye, is infinitely more amusing, particularly as she starts to lose it and stuffs her face full of chocolate pumpkin pie. Mick Cain is superbly obnoxious as teenaged son Richard, though I never really saw the need for his character to disappear into the trees for a quick wank. Marion (Alexandra Holden) has one of those familiar faces but fails to impress as the unfortunate daughter.
Having feasted on recent delights such as The Texas Chainsaw Massacre, Dawn of the Dead and Wrong Turn, Dead End felt like a very poor relative. There were hints of style and flourishes of imagination that betrayed a better filmmaker but ultimately I found the film tiring and rather dull. I really wouldn't bother with this one.
Advantages: A bit different from other horrors, Leaves some things to your imagination Disadvantages: At times feels like a tv movie.
Dead End
Release Date: 2003
Certificate 15
Approx Running Time: 85 mins
Director: Jean-Baptiste Andrea
Frank Harrington (Ray Wise) and his family are driving to his Mother-In-Laws house, to celebrate Christmas. In the car with him are his wife Laura (Lin Shaye), his daughter Marion (Alexandra Holden), his son Richard (Mick Cain) and Marion's boyfriend Brad (Billy Asher). The trip isn't very pleasant for Frank with an uneasy atmosphere between ... ...wife constantly nagging him about anything and everything, and his son doing his very best to annoy and wind everybody up, especially Brad, who he seems to have a dislike of. After singing a few christmas carols and a little more bickering between Frank and Laura, everyone in the car falls asleep, and frank continues driving, although the piece and quiet, makes him start to doze off too. He awakens by a cars horn and sees headlights coming towards ...
Leigh36295 20.03.2008
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Ciao members have rated this review on average: very helpful Review of Dead End (DVD)
Advantages: Interesting, thought provoking, good example of low budget Disadvantages: Not good if you like your films well wrapped up
...away the point of watching. Dead End is an experience all the way through, not just saving the twists for the end, and so I won't take away from that by telling you the ins and outs.
It's very difficult to say WHAT this film is about, as a matter of fact. It's meaning is really down to interpretation, and there are many interpretations out there. As far as I'm aware (unless there is some extra on the DVD), the Directors / Writers have not given ... ...at other people's opinions on Dead End, is that a lot of people dismiss it outright, partly because it's a low budget film, and partly because it is not an immediately obvious plot. With regards to the 'not an obvious plot' side of this, what I would say is, if you don't mind not knowing exactly what the director was thinking, and having to put your own theories in there, then you'll get along just fine. If you like your well wrapped up happy endings, ...
Magdalena 21.09.2005
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Ciao members have rated this review on average: very helpful Review of Dead End (DVD)
Advantages: funny, great cast, entertaining Disadvantages: not a usual horror flick
...Andrea, Fabrice Canepa Dead End Written By: Jean-Baptiste Andrea, Fabrice Canepa Studio: Pathe Distribution Ltd
Dead End Cast:
Ray Wise, Alexandra Holden, Lin Shaye, Mick Cain,
Billy Asher, Amber Smith, Karen Gregan, Steve Valentine,
Sharon Madden, Clement Blake, Jimmy Skaggs, Ivan Kraljevic
Rating: 15
This isn’t a horror movie with lots of gore but more psychological. You’re seeing a family confined into a small and cramped car wanting to ... ...of gore to scare but Dead End does standout as it has some very funny and dark humour to it. It does have very scary moments that will leave your nerves jumping or finding the pillow to hide your face. The scare scenes do have a bizarre quirkiness to them, which will keep you gripped to the movie. The dialogues are very witty especially from the younger son Richard. It relieves a lot of the tension of the situation. The dialogue gets even funnier ...
madhatter7880 29.07.2004
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Ciao members have rated this review on average: very helpful Review of Dead End (DVD)
Dead End (2003)
It’s Christmas Eve and the Harringtons are going to visit relatives in the country. It’s an annual do and Frank, the father, always insists on driving. Although this year he’s having a little trouble staying awake in the dark, and takes a different route off the highway to keep his mind stimulated. His wife, Laura, children Richard and Marion, and Marion’s boyfriend are all asleep. They all wake up when Frank dozes off and has a ... ...ruin the tension. Dead End is quite clearly the first film from writers and directors Jean Baptiste Andre and Fabrice Canepa, but in no bad way. The minimal locations and small cast are fitting with a low budget first feature, and they use them to the fullest. The amount of amusing and believable dialogue on display helps you ease into the plot and characters mindset. They’ve perfectly judged the introductory scenes to allow the anticipation to slowly ...
ThePolarOne 23.03.2005
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Ciao members have rated this review on average: very helpful Review of Dead End (DVD)
Advantages: he who dares Disadvantages: never enough....
DEAD END by Jean-Baptiste Andrea and Fabrice Canepa
I really don’t know why “Dead End”, is rate as a low-budget horror. Remember Leland from Lora Palmer’s Diary, a father who abused and killed his daughter in “Twin Peaks”? Well, that’s him, starring Ray Wise, in the film “Dead End”. At first it feels like an extended episode of The Twilight Zone, but on the other glance, it's chilling enough ... ...a Twilight Zone episode stretched out into a horror feature, without subtext. I think that it can be rate as a road move just as well, because it is happening on one dark and gloomy road.
It's the night of a Christmas Eve; Frank Harrington is driving his family to a Christmas diner at his family house. But his year, he's taking a short cut through the woods. A short cut that will become a decision they'll regret. A mysterious woman in white lurking ...
barefoot777 11.05.2004
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Ciao members have rated this review on average: very helpful Review of Dead End (DVD)
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Advantages: The discs may make nice coasters Disadvantages: We lost part of the ozone in producing this movie.
Through the passages of time there are certain movies that are spoken about with a sort of legendary status. For me my niche area is horror movies, from as far back as I can remember people spoke of The Texas Chainsaw Massacre. A few years later and I started to hear about I Spit On Your Grave, and then someone mentioned Last House On DeadEnd Street. While Texas Chainsaw Massacre and I first met about 10 years ago, and I Spit followed a few years later; Last House On DeadEnd Street kind of eluded me. It would be bought up in conversation then forgotten, where as normally as soon as something comes up I immediately make a purchase. It was not until recently however when sorting through a massive stock of DVD?s I purchased some 4 years ago that I discovered for the last few years I had been sitting on this ?gem?.
Gem is by far a word ...
Advantages: Loads of gore right from the start Disadvantages: Storyline could be better
Wrong Turn 2: DeadEnd
Director: Joe Lynch
Released: 25 August 2007
Runtime: 93 minutes
Certificate: 18
Cast:
Erica Leerhsen - Nina
Henry Rollins - Colonel Dale Murphy
Texas Battle - Jake
Daniella Alonso - Amber
Steve Braun - Jonesy
Aleksa Palladino - Mara
Matthew Currie Holmes - Michael
Crystal Lowe - Elena
Kimberly Caldwell - Kimberly
Wayne Robson - Old Man
Ken Kirzinger - Pa
Ashlea Earl - Ma
Clint Carleton - Brother
Rorelee Tio - Sister
Jeff Scrutton - Three Finger
Story:
The story begins with Kimberly a contestant for a post nuclear fallout reality survival show called apocolyse. On her way to the filming location she runs down a deformed looking crazy hillbilly freak and she checks to see if it is ok but soon realises it is her that will be needing the help as another quickly ...
Advantages: none at all Disadvantages: weak plot, too predictable and no realism
Rollins' line about "Post Apocolyptic Crazies are waiting all around to take you down", well he wasn't to know how right he was? It was pretty predictable that the token Asian Guy died 1st. Henry Rollins as a former Marine Colonel gets captured by the mountain people WAY too easily.
The camera guy is caught by his girlfriend getting a blow job so you know he is going to die! It also gets the producer girl killed by an Axe in the head as she escaped from the house. Cutting to the cameraman boyfriend (totally unaware his lady is dead) with the girl who had been giving him a blow job pulling on her panties is there to tell us they have had sex while his girlfriend was being killed. As any good horror fan knows that means both of them will die, having had sex. We also get a shot of one of the mountain people who had obviously been watching them ...
Deleted Scenes, Featurette - 1. Behind-the-scenes, UK Theatrical Trailer, Teaser Trailers, TV Spots, Interactive Menu Screens, Chapter Selections, Scene Access, Interactive Menus
Sound
Dolby Digital 5.1, Dolby Digital Mono, Dolby Digital Stereo
Dubbing Sound
Dolby Digital 5.1 English, Dolby Digital Mono English French German Italian Spanish, Dolby Digital Stereo English
Aspect Ratio
16:9 Anamorphic Wide Screen, Full Frame
Professional reviews
Review
"...Hugely entertaining... Packed with delicious scares and pitch-black menace..." (Hotdog, )
DVD Description
A road movie with a decidedly fatal destination. Frank Harrington (Ray Wise) is begrudgingly taking his family to spend Christmas with his in-laws. His wife Laura (Lin Shaye) tries to jolly him along and placate their teenage son Richard, and their daughter Marion (Alexandra Holden) who is bringing along her boyfriend Brad. Frank decides to take a short-cut through some deserted woods, but the road seems to go on for ever. Suddenly a woman appears in the road and Frank stops the car to help. It's not help that she's after...
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