More hype than Phantom Menace

Rating: 5/10 (22 December 1999)

We waited about 5 months for this film to get to Australia, and you know what, it wasn't worth the wait. Even the underwhelming Star Wars ep.1 wasn't this much of a disappointment. Is it well acted? Yeah, mostly. Does it look "real"? Well it *does* look like they're wandering in the woods... Is it plausible or realistic? Well.. no, not really - do teenagers really react that way to things that go bump in the night - I dont think so! Is it SCARY? Well, er.. no frankly it isn't. I tried to be scared, really I did, but I've seen plenty of TV movies that were a lot better at scaring me than this mediocre film. And lastly, was it boring? Unfortunately, yes it was, at least a lot of the time. I think the only thing that was true was the effect of the handheld camera - I dont get affected by that sort of thing, but my partner felt quite sick by the end of the film. The biggest let-down of the year, overall.