Tumbas abiertas

OK, so I know better than to watch movies on SciFi . . . er, sorry . . . SyFy. Or shifafa. Or whatever it is now. So sue me. I spent my whole Saturday doing advisory-board brainstorming for a nonprofit. I can be forgiven for flopping into my armchair and wanting to watch some movie I'd never seen, rather than read Proust in the original or learn how to play the oud.

Which is to say, I didn't deserve Open Graves. Of which I saw none, incidentally. Were there any? Did I fall asleep? Why is it called this?

Some icky visuals. Not many scares. As with too many films in modern horror films, no reasons are given--apart from shared humanity--to care about any of these people. Half a point, though, for the legless entrepreneur, who was clichéd but did have one good scene.

It all sort of plays like Final Destination delivered via a board game. The game does have an intriguing look to it, and it involves one of my favorite old conundrums. I'll give it that much. The drawback there is that the game possessed more personality than most of the characters.

As for the end, if you didn't see it coming, then I think YOU fell asleep. Somewhere back around the dawn of the genre.

Open Graves starts out as something at least different enough from the repetitive ghost stories that became too common in the last few years.

Well technically it shares many similar aspects, but remains reasonably different mainly through methods of offing the victims. Unfortunately not different enough.

As oversaturate formula demands, we quickly learn several characters are going to die because of a certain event, and after the first few deaths we already know how everything's will play out. After which we're subjected to scenes of the remaining characters, or at least the central ones trying to figure out what's causing the deaths before it's their turn.

And of course, Open Graves follows the tradition of similar mystery- related films in the sense that once the cast discover an objective, any characterization disappears, the mystery itself becoming supposedly more important than giving the audience any interest in the people trying to solve it.

Handsome American guy is vacationing in Spain when some guy in a shop asks him if he has healthy desires and gives him a centuries old antique board game for nothing. No, sir, I see nothing odd or sketchy about that. He takes the board game and gets the other characters to play it with him. Hilarity ensues. I mean evil ensues. Oh no, you die for real if you lose the game.

So it's an about evil board game that kills people. This would be a tough premise to pull off effectively under the best circumstances. They don't really pull it off here. Eliza Dushku is always good and the rest of the cast is serviceable enough. The dialogue is more than a little stilted and awkward. The plot is a mish-mash of other movies about cursed, evil stuff that's cursed. They way it is set up takes away nearly all of the suspense. There's a fair amount of CGI and it's really bad even for the time. It's bad enough that it kind of ruins the impact of some of the death scenes. The ending is just terrible. I mean throw stuff at your TV bad. The ending alone brought this one from a 5 to a 3.

This movie kept me entertained, or a least awake through to the end. Some of the story was not predictable but a lot was. The supporting plot (kind of the history and rule of this enchanted/cursed game) just happen to show up when the plot deadened. Too much of this weak plot structure throughout movie. The plot is that 6 young adults play a board game and stuff happens. Humankind meets Ouige for for the thriller/slasher crowd, but doesn't hold the morbid action. Theres a huge hole in the plot line.. starts with the Spanish Inquisition where a monk is sent to rid the world of its evil by burning it, but on second thought..."Next 2020 and a creepy used crap-store is selling it, and the store manager coaxes this American blond surfer dude to take it and play Mamba, (the name of the game). Specially when the nonstop surf and beach crowd are rainout of there fun during a "spring break-like" holiday. And they do, all apps, drinking dancing, mating is out on hold so these kids can play their recently acquired board game.

The plot of "Open Graves" is very simple:it's about a board game called Mamba,where the players die in real life the same way they die in the game.Laughable death scenes include killings via computer generated crabs and snakes.The characters are cardboard and deliberately annoying and there isn't even a tiny bit of suspense.I liked Eliza Dushku in "Wrong Turn",but she is completely wasted and unmemorable here.The climax with CGI-witch coming from the sea is utterly laughable and stupid.The only reason to see "Open Graves" are some interesting camera angles plus sexy Eliza Dushku.If such movies are the future of horror then I seriously give up.Give me any 70's or 80's low-budget horror flick over this modern piece of crap.A generous 3 out of 10.