Donner Pass

I have no idea why this film is classified as a horror. It's a slow-paced borderline thriller with a bit of slasher material. It's ordinary and unoriginal, but still somewhat watchable at least.

The film makers had no intentions of making historically accurate statements regarding the real story of the Donner party. It's a shame, because true accounts of the incident can readily be found in any library or online. A more comprehensible and effective horror story could have been woven from actual facts. Hear Me, producers? A little homework could have made for a more believable movie.

What we have is a movie based loosely around supposed local legends. The plot is mostly able to be followed, yet bizarre and insensible. Thus, the film staggers about stupidly like an old drunk spouting tall tales.

I did like a few moments of the camera work and set and there's beautiful scenery at times. It's unmistakably low-budget, but manages a few nice shots. In large though, the camera work is an amateur production, just shy of shoddy.

There's sexuality and heavy drinking in this movie, plus partial frontal nudity in one scene, so this is not for young eyes. There is gore, but it's no where near as disgusting as the gore you'll find in similar films that have came out recently. It's more on par with the Nightmare on Elm Street movies.

I am unimpressed, but do NOT feel that the experience was a total waste of time given My original expectations for it.

Whoopee. Yet another movie about unlikable young adults (in this case a few nerds and a few dumb gorillas) who go into the woods to be slaughtered by a serial killer. You know it's going to be bad when the prequel involves people wearing makeup that looks like it came from a junior high school play. The slasher genre has been to the movie industry THE most overused genre in history. Not even westerns or vampire movies have consistently pumped out so many examples of crapola with only slightly different variations in theme (in this case watch the monologue during the musical Don't Go In The Woods for the plot). The only slasher movies that actually succeed are those with original stories to tell, and/or shocking and gory special effects, real SCARES (remember scares?), and good acting.

This new addition, Donner Pass, has none of it. The premise is okay except the movie takes it nowhere but to the old tired formula of young adults finding their friends dead and getting scared and panicky. In this case the acting is horrible; but not as horrible as the writing is, however; with each turn I wished that I had written it so that there would be more emotion and more realistic human interaction between the characters.

This is one of those movies where you sit through it (if you can) saying, "Oh, this is so stupid" and by the time the twist comes involving someone you already suspecting explaining why he's the actual serial killer, during the final twenty minutes ala Scream, you are already asleep.

I don't understand why movies like this keep getting made. Who pays for this crap? There must be a market, otherwise, why make them? There is a market for crack cocaine too, but Donner Pass is like a bag filled with Ivory Soap. Why do slasher films these days feature characters that we don't even like? It makes no sense. I mean, I don't care if any of these characters get killed; in fact, I wish they would get killed--they are so annoying--but when they do get killed it's not even satisfying because the lack of imagination from the special effects person can't even deliver a good death scene. So what's the point? What we get is yet another, and I repeat--another--ninety minutes of some young adults in a cabin in the woods waiting to get killed. Literally. Come on. Seriously.

Gee, I know how to save this movie, throw in a completely unexplained ripoff of REC for a few minutes at the end. NOT. Here we actually had a real opportunity with the unwanted guests and all, and it could have been a truly violent mixture of Last House On The Left and Halloween; but, instead, nothing happens out of the usual pathetic tired old dusty genre.

Overall the movie was really good. I only watched it because I really like the Donner Party Story and because I don't read synopsis I assumed this movie was about the original story. I was mad when the first 5 minutes were very wrong about the actually events. When it turned out it was a horror movie based on the events I was willing to give it a chance.

It turned out to be a really good lower budget with good actors and an unexpected plot twist. For a movie in it's class the acting, casting and production value was excellent. Overall a good horror movie for any one who enjoys them and I would definitely recommended it.

Another "what if the legend is true" movie. This is about the story of Donner Pass, and how a family was abandoned in the forest. This leads to dinner time for crazy George Donor (Eric Pierpoint). So now we know this is a movie about cannibalism. Fast forward about 150 years (they may have said exactly, but was already bored) and 4 kids are going to stay at their parents cabin for the weekend in Donnors Pass. So now the stage is set to find out if the legend is true.Of course the obligatory "extra friends" show up to crash the party (which is good, we needed more people to kill). Well, the obvious occurs and the group is picked off one by one. Not particularly extremely gory or really well written either. There is one kill that is absolutely asinine it is almost worth watching just for it. Well the characters aren't worth wasting time commenting about, they are all poorly played and given nothing really to work with, so blame whomever you like (The chick that played the stuck up bitch was spot on for the girl all you women hated in high school). The scenery was very nice (I am a sucker for snow covered mountains, too bad they didn't utilize this more) and is filmed quite nicely for the budget I am sure this had. If by now you haven't figured it out, the movie is not very good at all. No scares, very little story until the writers must've all of a sudden had an epiphany and decided to pull the story together(should they be vampires, or zombies, or just cannibals). IF you have nothing else to watch and you DON'T have to pay for it, then I guess it is up to you. But make sure you meet those guidelines. Also if you really have a need to watch a movie about cannibals and would like to see how they can be made well, watch "Ravenous", you will definitely be happy you did. Anyway, I will stop degrading this movie as the worst ever, it really isn't, it just has so many flaws that it makes it tough to swallow (kind of like human flesh, not that I would know ;) 3.6/10 IMDb 4.6 (many cast members must be voting)

In1846, in the Sierra Nevada Mountains in the area known as Donner Pass, a starving man kills three others to eat their flesh during the winter, but a boy witnesses the murders and flees.

In the present days, the teenagers Kayley (Desiree Hall), her boyfriend Mike (Colley Bailey), her cousin Nicole (Adelaide Kane) and the outcast Thomas (Erik Stocklin) travel to the house in Donner Pass of Thomas's parents that are in Europe. Thomas recommends his friends to be careful with the house since his parents do not know that they are spending the weekend there. They learn that the police are hunting down the criminal James Michael Epstein (John Kassir). Out of the blue, the troublemaker boyfriend of Nicole, Derek (Dominic DeVore), comes with his friends Brody (Antonio Trischitta), Valerie (Krystal Davis) and A.J. (Brandon Morales) in his SUV to stay with Nicole, despite the protests of Thomas. Soon their beer runs out and Brody drives the SUV to buy some more in the town. Brody goes missing and soon Mike, Kayley and Thomes find his body eaten. Meanwhile Valerie is murdered near the house and the car has flat tires. Who might be the cannibal that is attacking the group?

"Donner Pass" is a terrible slasher with an awful gore story of cannibalism and one-dimensional characters. The explanation for the anthropophagy is ridiculous and most of the characters are non- charismatic. In the end, watching "Donner Pass" is a complete waste of time. My vote is three.

Title (Brazil): Not Available