Chain Letter

I was looking through Red Box the other night when I rented this load of crap. I saw Brad Dourif and Keith David in the credits so I figured it had some merit, wrong. Hey these days torture porn and teen slasher movies are almost passé. Serial killer movies have grown from genre to category next to Drama or Comedy. No one expects too much from any of these genres but this movie manages to out stupid the worst in each of the above genres.

OK, teens get weird chain email threatening death if they don't spam 5 friends with a forward of the email. So real steel chains are literally used to dismember these teenagers if they delete CHAIN letter, get it? It was reminiscent of Hellraiser with all those chains and hooks tearing into bodies but minus the supernatural voodoo that made that movie bearable. First off, there is supposed to be some sort of conspiracy, some Luddite anti technology group that is protesting our loss of privacy via cell phone and internet technology. So why pick 5 random teen agers to kill in a gruesome fashion but with no terrorist demands or media frenzy to promote the cause? In all those teen slasher movies the teens did something or went somewhere they weren't supposed to and the monster had some good reason to kill them, like they just had sex or something. But no real motives here, from a cell of supposed warped Unibomber type geniuses who want to send out a message. Then the conspiracy finds some Leather Face Texas Chainsaw guy to do the actual murders, which makes so much sense. Then, for all the yapping about decreased privacy due to things like cell phone tracking, all the teens were killed right at their homes or in their favorite haunts, that took no technical wizardry past a phone book to track them. Then we have a veteran cop who is supposed to be tracking all this but never once does he call in for any sort of backup as he goes rummaging around empty plant buildings by his lonesome in his town's biggest crime wave investigation.

Finally there is this utterly stupid and gory dismemberment scene that opened and closed the film, literally a repeat. There was no coherent plot and a cheap theme that doesn't even tie the movie together. There was one teen who even forwarded the messages but got wasted anyways as soon as he deleted his copy. It made no sense on so many levels and was simply a cheapest sort of exploitation of an exploitation movie. I also rented & watched "I am No. 4" from Redbox last weekend and that was a turkey too. But at least that one had a coherent if silly and derivative plot.

Chain Letter is not very good. I can relax my standards for horror movies typically if it has some redeeming qualities. An interesting character or a cool villain or unique plot are all components that can get me through. This movie lacked all of these and really lacked any hope of being a decent movie.

The movie seems so similar to any horror movie that it's hard to find anything it does well. If you like gruesome deaths, than it has a couple unique "chain related" moments. Other than that, the movie is shallow story wise, has flat characters provides very little pay off. There isn't much suspense built up either, but certain scenes showed some promise.

I wouldn't recommend this movie to anyone unless they absolutely love chains.

This is completely pointless movie, one of those where you watch it to see what happens and then it just ends suddenly and you think WTF? Normally in slasher movies like this you'd think the weakest points are the plot and the acting. Surprisingly, there was nothing wrong with the acting. The main cast did what they were meant to but the ultra poor script didn't have any proper development for each character so there was nothing much to feel for any of them. Even the premise of the story didn't make sense. A huge guy with a bandaged face sends out chain letter e-mails to people with the threat of death of they don't play the game. What the game is...no one knows because all the letter says is that if you don't play you die. There's no mention if you delete the e-mail you die or if you don't forward the message you die. This movie is that lame that a few simple rules aren't even scripted in.

Some of the deaths are truly gory, even by Saw standards. But in the grand scheme of things they are entirely pointless. Even the Saw scenes had some intelligence to the deaths- you're a bad person but you get a chance at redemption but not until you go through a trial by fire and lots of pain. The deaths in Chain Letter are just gore and pain. This makes watching any Paris Hilton movie fun and educational.

Deon Taylor should be made to undergo one of the death scenes in his movie- either that or threaten him with a scene if he doesn't stop writing and directing such rubbish.

Recommendation: only if you like to pull out your fingernails with a tweezer dipped in acid.

CHAIN LETTER is yet another SAW derivative, this time made with a plot that copies that of THE RING. It involves a viral chain letter that's being spread by the Internet and mobile phones; little do those who receive the letter realise that it's been sent by a masked killer who's ready to bump off those who refuse to forward it on.

Yeah, the plot makes little sense when you look at it like that, so what we're left with here is a series of gory set-pieces combined with a police investigation into the murders. In reality CHAIN LETTER is an excuse for some very gory murder scenes inevitably involving chains, although they're handled quite cheesily and are never disturbing.

That's pretty much all the film has going for it, because the characters are extraordinarily dull and the it also manages to waste the talents of not one but two cult actors: Keith David (THE THING) plays a detective, and Brad Dourif (CHILD'S PLAY) is a teacher. Elsewhere we get Betsy Russell to hammer home the SAW connection while Michael Bailey Smith (THE HILLS HAVE EYES remake) is the hulking but brain-dead bad guy. Other than the fun gore there's nothing going for this one whatsoever.

The movie starts out very well and the whole movie has the golden rules for horror, which most of us have gotten tired of since it makes movies too predictable, and this movie is no exception.

The movie builds up very well and with good pacing. You get the chance to get to know a few of the characters on a deeper level, but nothing to stand up for. The gore is very well made and not over done, that's actually the best about this movie, the killings. The ending was very weak, very predictable and didn't leave you in awe as Secret Window or Identity did.

Chain Letters, we have all received them and we all hate them, and most of us delete them before finishing reading them without thinking about it. That's what makes this movie quite alright on the plot part, it's a nice fresh idea to what Wes Craven started back in '96 with "Scream" (the teenage horror flicks) or perhaps he started it with "A Nightmare on Elm Street" back in '84, depends on how you look at it.

I kind of liked the movie, but it's a one time watch. You should watch this when you're in the mood for a simple flick with minimum amount of brain activity usage, because this is not one to watch when you're actually in the mood for a movie evening with your partner or friends.

I rate this ******