Descendant

1st watched 11/1/2014 – 2 out of 10(Dir-Kermit Christman & Del Tenney): Confusing, amateurish production revolves around a late descendant of Edgar Allen Poe, played by Katherine Heigl, meeting another supposed descendant who is also a writer, played by Jeremy London. These two folk get involved with each other then all goes haywire. The plot actually is a lot more complicated than this so I'll try to break it down. This writer sees visions of "Edgar Allen" as he tries to write a novel and break away from his roots. His agent has the last name of "Usher", which is the family that had it against the Poe's as shown in the first scene where an Usher kills a Poe. If you are confused now it gets worse as the movie goes forward. Some murders start happening in the local area as we are introduced to a variety of characters who either have the "hots" for Heigl's character or there is some other reason that they could possibly be the murderer. And then, of course, we have the writer – Ethan Poe – who is also a suspect because of his past and his eccentricity. So – do we care about the Poe vs. distant cousin romance or the murder mystery or neither – I take neither. I don't know if the fault of the movie is the original story or the adaptation or the director's, but it doesn't come across like anyone really had a handle on what they wanted to do with the material. London, unfortunately is handed a role that is inconsistent from scene to scene and he hams it up pretty good. Heigl seems extremely unsure of herself early in the movie, but gets better as it progresses. The story starts as a mystery/romance but changes to a psycho horror movie before the end. It would be interesting to know the progression and history of this film's production because it has two directors, two actors that are involved in the writing of the movie, and comes across like a TV movie at times with fadeouts like it's going to a commercial. The bottom line is the confusion turns the viewer away from the film pretty early on so pass this one up unless you just have to see Heigl in an early film.

I don't usually comment, but there are things that need to be said. Where to start...

The acting, on Jeremy London's part was horrible! I didn't think he could be so bad. The plot could have been good, had it been well directed, along with a good solid performance from the lead actor. Unfortunately, this is one of those movies you read about and think it has great potential to be entertaining, but get disappointed from the start.

Well, at least I got good laughs. I wouldn't waste my time if I were you.

an imaginative tale of the modern day Poe's and Ushers, with some very good acting and a well done script all add up to a flick that was far better than it's straight to video fate. Katherine Heigl is gorgeous as well as talented, and the superb Jeremy London (Party of Five's Griffin) puts in a great performance as the haunted writer who may or not be all there. Interesting that they wove in bits of pieces of Hitchcock's Suspicion as well, come to think of it, if they were going to do a remake of that classic flick, Heigl and London's chemistry would serve them well. Sadly, 99% of the folks renting flicks these days have no idea who Poe was, and will not get most of this flick's storyline....too bad for them. 7 out of 10 stars, good job all around, the major subtraction being that York Video used the same house where this takes place in their laugher/slasher/thriller Scream Bloody Murder, weirdly enough, I rented both of them on the same trip!!!

The Film must have been shot in a day,there are scenes where you can see the camera reflections and its red pointer,even the scenery's green light that blends with the actors!!!The plot and the lines are really awful without even the slightest inspiration(At least as a thriller genre movie).Everything that got to do with Poe in the movie,has a shallow and childish approach.The film is full of clise and no thrilling.If you want to watch a funny b-movie for a relaxing evening with friends then go for it you will enjoy it (As I Did) but there's no way to take this film seriously!