Dark Ride

Dark Ride was exactly what it is suppose to be.. A throw back to the 80 horror movie of college age kids being killed and then the surprise twist ending.. It was not the greatest movie but I enjoyed it due to all the memories it brought back, from Funhouse (which it is almost a copy) to the burning, Friday the 13th, sleepaway camp, etc etc.. Acting was OK, and the premise was OK as well, How ever, premise is many years ago, two kids get killed, now years later, the killer escapes and this is when the kids decide to go and look at the ride.. Twist ending later, (its not bad but didn't quite explained how it just ended up that happen at that time, but all in all it was not a bad movie.. Compare to most of the movies of horror filmfest, this was actually one of the better ones..

Saw this recently on a dvd. As a fan of After dark horror fest, this film was on my radar for a long time. Dark Ride is nothing special from a story standpoint. Every classic slasher trope and cliche imaginable was used in this film. The character traits, situations, and dialogue feel formulaic. After the opening murder scene, it takes a hell lottuva time for the thrill ride to jump start. There ain't any good kills except for one which i don't want to spoil. Also some of the scenes r filled with annoying flickering lights. Again like many 80s slasher films, we get to see characters doing stupid things. Splitting up, ample time to run but jus keep on screaming n crying, not taking an effort to fight back. We also get to see a psycho breaking his cuffs n escaping from a mental asylum like a piece of cake, etc. A hot girl wandering n hitchhiking in the middle of nowhere. I think this film seems to have been made in the wrong time period or mayb viewed by me in a totally wrong time.

Part of the popular After Dark Horror Film Festival (which included the remarkable horror film, "The Abandoned" among seven others), "Dark Ride" is a weirdly entertaining little slasher film heavily reminiscent of Tobe Hooper's "The Funhouse". The story follows a group of college friends who decide to go on a trip during spring break. While driving through New Jersey late one night, they have a bizarre encounter at a gas station, and later pick up a ditsy hitchhiker with a good stash of drugs. The kids decide to stop at an amusement park to check out the "dark ride", a horror ride that was closed down for years after two twin sisters were murdered there in 1989. The murderer is now institutionalized, but for these unlucky teenagers, he has escaped within the past two weeks. As they enter the ride and decide to spend some time messing around in there with all of the scary props and whatnot, they aren't aware of the real horrors that await them.

While this film was very obviously inspired by Tobe Hooper's slasher film, "The Funhouse", it honestly is nowhere near as good. But would one expect it to be any better? Nah, I don't think so. Besides this, "Dark Ride" is still an enjoyable little blood-soaked horror flick. The plot is beyond derivative, and the script is pretty jammed full with typical horror set-ups and clichés - we've seen it all before, plenty of times. Not much originality here, but oh well. While the story does lack any uniqueness or originality, it makes up for it with some good thrills and a full plate of some cheap (but clever) scares and violence. It's a pretty gory film, but I think that's what it was going for anyway so it works. We have plenty of gruesome stabbings, slashings, head-splittings, and a grossly clever decapitation that could likely become of cult status (I won't explain, you'll know it when you see it for sure). The sets inside the horror ride were really nicely done, and appropriately spooky. Amusement rides like that have an eerie thing about them anyway, so I love the setting.

The acting in the film is so-so. Jamie Lynn-DiSalca (of TV's "The Sopranos") is the heroine, and is just alright - not anything mind blowing, but passable enough with her performance. The male stars are actually the better actors in the film though, I'm sure some of you will recognize Patrick Renna of the '90s Disney film, "The Big Green", I knew I'd seen that face before. The rest of the cast isn't bad, but the performances were overall no more than average (if not a little below). When considering what type of movie this is though, the acting quality is almost irrelevant. The killer in the film is creepy, not because of his physical deformity, but more so because of his child-like porcelain mask that he wears throughout the film. I thought the 'twist' in the end was actually pretty good, it came totally out of nowhere for me, so I have to give that some credit because the writing there was pretty good.

Overall, "Dark Ride" is an enjoyable little slasher fest that isn't much more than that. It's formulaic, clichéd, and predictable in quite a few ways. But it still manages to be entertaining and fun aside from it's downfalls. Hardened horror buffs will know exactly what to expect, and will feel like they've seen it a hundred times. But if you enjoy a good old corny slasher flick, this weird little throwback to '80s style splatter pictures might be an enjoyable find. It isn't a great movie by any means, but I have to give it a half-and-half rating at least because it was pretty entertaining for what it was. 5/10.

Dark Ride features a gruesome opening sequence, a young woman being decapitated whilst delivering a blow job, and an outstanding vertical head slice—moments of gore which would automatically earn a movie a recommendation from me. Unfortunately, the film as a whole is so stale that it ends up as just one more reason for me to be wary of Lionsgate releases.

A blatant rip-off of Tobe Hooper's The Funhouse (1981), Dark Ride sees a bunch of obnoxious teenagers (hot women, some studs, and a guy who looks like an unhealthy, ginger Elijah Wood) being murdered by a hulking psycho after opting to spend the night in an abandoned fairground ride. Whilst The Funhouse wasn't exactly the greatest example of the slasher genre, it could at least boast a modicum of originality and a style of its own; writer/director Craig Singer, on the other hand, clearly has very few fresh ideas, and is content to plagiarise both the look and feel of Hoopers' film.

Less savvy horror fans unaware of the film's obvious cribbing might get a kick out of Dark Ride, but for those in the know, my advice is to save yourself some time and money and just enjoy the best bits on YouTube.

In 1989, in New Jersey, two sisters are killed in a ghost train in the greatest attraction of the Asbury Park, the Dark Ride. The police arrest the serial killer that is sentenced to life in a mental institution; finds fourteen other bodies hidden in the spot and the justice shuts-down the attraction. Fourteen years later, a group of five friends and a hitchhiker decides to visit the amusement park that is offering free lodging in its reopening. Meanwhile, the psychopath escapes from the asylum and while the group is inside the Dark Ride, they are chased and killed by the murderer.

The slasher "Dark Ride" is a boring collection of clichés. Whatever the viewer may expect in a B-movie of the genre, he or she will find in this flick: bad acting, poor screenplay and budget, breasts, screams, the victims splitting from the group and killed one by one, "unexpected" twist etc. In the end, watching this flick is a pure waste of time. My vote is three.

Title (Brazil): "Trem Fantasma" ("Ghost Train")