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A DVD Review of...
  
Images (C) New Line Cinema, 2002 |
Genre: Suspense/Thriller
Cast: Ali Larter, A.J. Cook, Michael Landes, Terrence "T.C." Carson, Keegan Connor Tracy
Synopsis: Sequel to the 1998 hit New Line teen thriller. Driving with a group of friends to Daytona Beach, Kimberly (Cook) has a sudden premonition that saves them all from a catastrophic freeway pileup … or so it seems. Ali Larter returns from the first film as Clear Rivers, the lone survivor of the Flight 180 airplane crash, whom Kimberly goes to see once death starts coming after her friends. It’s a rollercoaster ride of fear and fate as Kimberly races to save her friends and herself from the implacable jaws of death..
Film Review: At a time when the teen horror film genre was devolving into mediocre efforts like "Disturbing Behaviour" and "Idle Hands", New Line came along with the superbly entertaining "Final Destination" - a teen horror suspense film which instead of relying on cheap serial killer stalkers went for the more grandiose concept that death itself (a formless dark shape) was stalking these people and setting up an elaborate series of accidents which eventually lead to each one's demise in unique and over the top gory ways. Two of "The X-Files" best writers Glen Morgan and James Wong who created the first film have now left the franchise though many of its key personnel from actress Ali Larter to super producers Craig Perry & Warren Zide remain to churn out this sequel.
The good news is its a hoot. FD2 may lack the interesting characters and slightly more complex storyline of the first feature, instead it trades it in for even more gore and laughs with a whole new cast of young unknowns. From the opening and utterly spectacular massive car crash to numerous and unique deaths involving the likes of plate glass, barbeques, barb wire and more - we're regularly taunted and tricked into believing various red herrings in regards to how each subject is going to die - but when it happens it proves quite spectacularly morbid and colourful each and everytime. The cast do solid jobs with the material, Ali Larter turning in a decent go returning as the now institutionalised Clear Rivers (a porn star name if I ever heard one) whilst A.J. Cook & Michael Landes make for likable leads. Tony Todd puts in a deliciously fun cameo too.
Faults? A subplot about a pregnant survivor never really clicks. With the exception of Larter & Landes (whose most remembered for a brief stint on "Lois & Clark") the stars are complete unknowns which may turn some off from the material. The gorier edge makes this less accessible than the first film, and the somewhat pedantic talk about 'a rift in death's design' does get overdone and overdiscussed a lot. Finally, the new 'twist' to it for this film is fun but never truly convincing. The important thing is as sequels go this is a very good one and hopefully will lead to other outings for this franchise. You don't have to be a twisted and disturbed individual to get a lot of enjoyment out of FD2, but it sure helps.- Garth Franklin
"Final Destination 2: Infinifilm Series"
DVD Details In Brief (Region 1)
Rating: R
Runtime: 110mins
Versions: 16:9 Enhanced Widescreen, 4:3 Letterboxed
Aspect Ratio: 1.85: 1
Sound: Dolby Digital 5.1 & 2.0
Language & Sub-Titles: English
Audio: Commentary by Director David Elllis, Producer Craig Perry and Writers Eric Bress and J. Mackye Gruber.
Documentaries: Three Featurettes, Screen Tests
Clips: Deleted Scenes, Trailers, Music Video
Other: Interactive Game, Fact Track, Script
Region 1 vs. Region 4: No R4 Available |
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DVD Review: What's been a fun blackly comic horror series has also become a nice little DVD line for New Line. The first "Final Destination"
film had a good DVD, and while the second has less extras than you'd find on other "Infinifilm Series" discs it still has some great stuff here done
with care. The transfer in particular is without a doubt reference quality. New Line has pretty much got the film transfer onto DVD process
perfect in recent years and unlike other studios who only seem to use it on their big guns, these guys will spend the extra dough on all their
releases for disc and the quality shows. Colours, blacks, detail level, contrast, etc. are all at pitch perfect levels. There's the odd tiniest speck of
dirt or grain on the print but only the keenest viewer will notice. The sound is equally jaw-dropping with masterful use of surround (the crash
sequence is just head exploding awesome) and a rich range, surprising for a non-epic film. A commentary with the director, producer & two
writers is kind of fun, nothing special to be sure and it gets too much into minutae but they have fun relaying their experiences.
In the Beyond the Movie section there's the 14-minute "Terror Gauge" with researcher Dr. Victoria Ibric putting several young people into
a chair with wires to measure their responses to watching a horror film like FD2. Its an interesting idea but yields little in the way of interesting
results (slight rises in body temp and heartbeat, whooppee). "Cheating Death: Beyond and Back" focuses more on the issue of near-death experiences
and although some of the stories are so elaborate or over the top they're simply laughable, others will just have you rolling your eyes (I'll say one thing
for these people, they're devout). Capping it off is the rather silly "Choose Your Fate" game - apparently it seems 'I'm Hot' and the as usual quite
fun fact track text which plays alongside the movie and has some fun anecdotes.
"All Access Pass" contains the half-hour doco "Bits & Pieces", a very entertaining featurette about splatter movies and visual FX gore including the likes
of Producer Craig Perry, AICN's Moriarty himself Drew McWeeny, and the one and only Herschell Gordon Lewis talking about the rise of gore both
in olden times on the stage to very specific detail-by-detail descriptions of gore on film before becoming more of a behind-the-scenes feature on FD2
with looks at the elaborate car accident setup and how they pulled off each and every death. There's nearly ten minutes of deleted scenes with some meeting/dialgoue scene extensions (more Tony Todd for you buck), and a short but fast truck chase. Music videos consist of two duds - "Middle of Nowhere" by Blank Theory and "Seven Days a Week" by The Sounds, whilst some trailers for the two FD movies and "Highwaymen" round out the disc. A great fun little movie and a swell disc to boot.- Garth Franklin
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