Urban Legends: Final Cut (2000)

Attempting to finish film school, a director doing her film about a serial killer killing his victims on urban legends starts to realize that a serial killer is running around behind the scenes killing off the crew, and must stop the madman before killing off everyone on the film.This here was a pretty surprising entry. One of the things it does well is that it really features a lot of suspenseful work at times as this makes a hard time of determining if what's being seen is real or just being shot for the movie. It plays the movie-within-a- movie trick to nice effect, since it features enough to make hard to distinguish one from the other including it's wonderful opening sequence that takes a while before realizing after the fact it's been faked, a sequence where the assembled cast watch the dailies only for a strange cut-shot to play where one of the cast is viciously stalked and killed is screened where all but one thinking it to be shot for the film but the other positive that it's real and a later scene where a murder done during the recording of a scream- test loud enough to drown out the victim's own being great scenes. Even going away from that formula, there's some rather fun stalking here from the bathroom chase featuring the woman trying to escape from the killer out into the alleyway or a thrilling chase through the recording studio and out into the surrounding countryside and pool while an attack at a carnival ride hidden by the darkness and fog comes off rather nice as well. The final confrontation in the movie-set graveyard setting is just fun, being creepy, exciting and all-around a blast with the true revelation and the different twists featured throughout make for a nice time here. The last big feature here is a really nice and healthy mix amongst the kills, which along with the mask worn are the film's rather good parts. This one here only has a few flaws to it. The main one here is that the main explanation for the killing has a lot of ways for how to interpret it, and it feels just too clumsy and unrealistic to be considered as believable. The fact that the violence is toned down from anything that it should have, since, for all the creativity displayed in the kills, it isn't very bloody and with a couple of kills that could've been in here. These are the same thing that really should've fixed by taking more of those and making them more bloody. It would've taken out a mild flaw in the film rather simply. The last flaw in here is the film's maddening ability to switch between the film shoot and the real world. It's fun at times, but there's also the fact that the film tries to be clever with changing around the two and it gets a little harder to defend the longer they go on. These here are the film's flaws.Rated R: Graphic Violence, Graphic Language, Brief Nudity and a sex scene.

The sheer boringness of this movie hits me as I sit here and type out the lame, predictable plot. It's yet another predictable slasher fest which bears almost no resemblance to the first film, aside from a recurring character. Only one of the murders seems to actually have been based on an urban legend as well, so the ideas here are pretty loosely tied to the title. It seems to me that the recent frenzy for slasher films is on a downward spiral, what with this and the apparently awful SCREAM 3. Thankfully, I can't see much future in the genre as it now appears that all creativity and original ideas are completely dead... or so I hope. I just know that in all likelihood I'll be proved wrong.Starting off with an amusing reversal of the audience's expectations which I didn't see coming, we immediately meet a group of supremely untalented actors and actresses who do their best to be either funny/weird or generally menacing, in order that they become one of the film's many red herrings. Fans of mystery cinema would be well to give this film a wide berth, as the whodunit aspect is overplayed as always and it's one of those films where the killer turns out to be a minor character with absolutely LUDICROUS motivation. The ending, where the killer explains their reasons for doing what they do, had people groaning audibly in the cinema I was in as it was just so trite. And so it goes on.Aside from the group of nobody actors, where the acting skills range from passable to diabolical, and the clichéd plot and music, there's not really a lot else going on. Aside from one notable moment it's relatively gore-free too, although each of the different murders that occurs is particularly brutal in its own way, with characters getting bludgeoned repeatedly (with loud thunks on the soundtrack each time), painfully slashed with a straight-razor, or getting fried in electrics. Predictably the preferred method of weapon in the finale is the gun, which is another boring cop out.There are a heck of a lot of influences in this film to catch. The sole notable gore scene seems to have the same kind of style and progression as the deaths did in FINAL DESTINATION, while in a post-BLAIR WITCH PROJECT world the film manages to drag in some running around in the woods too. I have to admit that the producers did experiment with a lot of different effects, from having the characters watching a real-life snuff movie in the film while being blissfully unaware of what they're watching (a quite good moment, I have to admit) to an underground ghost train ride which has the potential of being quite good but is ruined by chopping editing and laughable action.This time the killer is predictably masked, with a fencing mask of all things. This may be the only original touch in the whole movie, the only thing that hasn't been done before. The characters are all severely grating and annoying, with some horrendous dialogue at some moments, where the script writers seem to be trying to make things as cheesy as they possibly can. I'm just sick and tired of these films with self-referential teens going on about previous films, with lots of in-jokes and "we're so clever" movie referencing. Just give it a rest.The film's highlight, and sole reason to watch, occurs at the beginning so at least you won't have long to wait before switching off. It's a murder scene based on the urban legend of waking up in a bath full of ice and missing your kidney. This has absolutely no connection to any of the characters or events in the rest of the film, but hey, it's pretty cool so I'll forgive them for that.

I kind of enjoyed the first film "Urban Legend" and probably my favourite of that long list of "Scream" imitators to follow. Straight to video "Final Cut" uses the same concept on a serial killer (donning a fencing mask) on campus using urban legends to dispatch students, but using a film within a film structure. However it lays it out in such a banal manner, still quite nasty delivering the shocks and twisty in its reveals. But it's moronic and generic as can be. At the time of its release the cast was virtually unknown with some just starting off, but now being quite well known. Loretta Devine (somewhat comic relief) is one of two to return from the original in a very unbelievable manner, while Rebecca Gayheart has a neat little reference to her original character. Jennifer Morrison is acceptable in the heroine role, with the likes of Mathew Davis, Eva Mendes, Anthony Anderson, Joseph Lawrence and Hart Bochner (who horror fans might remember in the 80s slasher "Terror Train"). The script really does like to throw about many movie references, which is never too distracting ("Digital sucks. Latex rules.") But it doesn't hide how contrived and silly it turns out to be. Not as clever as it thinks, when trying to blur the lines between reality and fantasy and the stalk and slash elements are very run-of- the-mill with little to no tension sustained. Slickly directed by John Ottman, but foreseeable and vanilla. "Urban legend my ass."

Studying at Alpine University, Amy Mayfield seeks help, especially from the late Travis Stark's twin brother Trevor Stark.She needs help to complete her thesis on Pendleton's 'urban legends' theme for Professor Solomon's film class.After the volunteers fall victim one by one to new urban legend-copycat-killings, both desperately dig for the truth to save themselves and hopefully their friends, all suspect as well as staff...Did we need a sequel to the original? I don't think so.But, even though it'ss one of the most pointless horrors going, it's really good for a comedy.devoid of any scares or ability have any element of fear in the film, we have to rely on the (some) now famous faces to provide something else other than scares. And they sort of give us what we want.The main story is like some watered down version of Scream 3 (a film that isn't very good either). Now while that movie takes itself very seriously, this thankfully doesn't.I don't know whether it was the makers intentions, but everybody has an 'evil' look about them during one scene in the film. It happens that much, that you really have no idea who the killer is until the big reveal at the end.So all in all, as a horror movie, it stinks, as a sequel, it stinks.As a diverting piece of humour it works, and for some reason, it's ever so surreal.