Comedy or thriller?

Rating: Null/10 (23 June 2001)

This film is advertised as a horror/thriller. It starts out that way too. The story is interesting enough to be an effective thriller. The first 20 minutes are the only moments that actually work as a triller, however. Soon our heroes are trying to fend off exceedingly elaborate Rube Goldberg death traps. The first one is very unpleasant. But after that, they are so far out that it's almost funny. By the final elaborate series of fateful coincidences, it's impossible to believe that the filmmakers weren't trying to be funny. It's almost as if they started out with a idea they thought would make a good horror film, but eventually they couldn't figure out how to carry it through to the end, so they decided to get wacky. A few years ago I would have hated this movie, but I've become so jaded by bad movies in my search for decent genre films that now it almost passes as a way to kill a couple of hours. Almost. With a bit of careful and restrained writing, this idea could have worked.