Not Unlike Porn: No Logic, No Story, Just Money Shots

Rating: 4/10 (11 February 2006)

This is not a good movie.
I went through other comments, and all that, and most of the "pro" comments seem to call it watchable, scary, gory, suspenseful... and the opening traffic accident is all of these things, but it fades away the instant this scene ends and the movie has to rely on its actors. It's not that they're bad, they're just under-directed, and stuck with a screenplay that has moments like, say, a character picks his jacket up, knocks a pool-ball to the floor, which rolls to a mousetrap, which snaps and flings the ball up into he air, knocking loose a suspended kayak, which swings loose and nearly kills someone. "Should have seen that coming," says the movie's most experienced character... Is that supposed to be a funny line? Seen that coming HOW, exactly? By watching out for pool balls? Not unlike Friday the 13th Part... I dunno, say, VII: The New Blood, this is NOT a good movie.
I'm defining "good movie" as something with character, a plot, and a conflict which must be resolved. The first one had these things. But "FD2" is structured like a porno-- the writers clearly got together beforehand and came up with each 'action' sequence, then cobbled together some terrible talking-scenes to hold them together. What saved this movie from being straight-to-video, I'd wager, is that the action scenes come off pretty well. Only half of them are clever or original, all are well staged and photographed, but what comes between them pales in comparison to "Mimic 2" or "Leprechaun 4: In Space." Director David Ellis, who is about as competent as the director of "The Fly II," must be the best liar in the world. "In this scene," he must have told an actor, "There's smoldering remains next to you, but don't show grief or horror, we'll work that out in editing." At least in the first one Devon Sawa was a good enough actor to pass off his lack of grief as growing madness. Here the actors just say the lines and move from scene-to-scene making no sense or logic, just chess pieces (well, checkers pieces) awaiting the next gore scene. And by the way-- the first film? The emphasis was on suspense, not blood.
The first film was something interesting and clever (and cool) from writers of "The X-Files." Here, the writing is embarrassingly incompetent, there's as much tension as a trip to the mailbox, and the director blew 80% of his budget on two scenes, and suddenly he's A-List for ten minutes. It won't last; the final twenty seconds of the film were the only cheer-worthy moments. Something else it has in common with "The Fly II" ... which shows you the kind of raw talent we're working with here. Car crash-- 9/10. Rest of film-- 1/10. Subtract a point for completely wasting Tony Todd, leaves us with 4/10.