Final Destination 5

Starring: Nicholas D'Agosto, Emma Bell, Miles Fisher, Ellen Wroe, Jacqueline MacInnes Wood, P.J. Byrne, David Koechner, Courtney B. Vance, Arlen Secarpeta, Tony Todd
Directed by: Steven Quale
Rating: R
Genre: Horror, Thriller
2011

Times Seen:
Tim: 1

Summary: A group of people survive a horrific bridge collapse, only to realize Death is tracking them down one-by-one.

Review:
Tim: Even with all my begging and pleading for the awfully named The Final Destination to be the last film of the franchise, it seems no one in Hollywood was listening. As this film's existence makes a lie out of the last film, I didn't have the highest expectations. Did we really need a fifth Final Destination movie? While this film isn't as good as the early years of this franchise, I have to admit it's better than the previous installment. I wasn't expecting that.

There's two big reasons why this movie turned the downward trend in quality around. First, the movie is darker and more serious than the last few installments. The franchise had become silly, with these overly elaborate, mousetrap-esque death sequences. While there's still some of that here, the deaths are much more believable (yes, there are several completely absurd moments, but it's still an improvement over the last one). I felt genuinely off-kilter about when the death would occur. The movie does a good job of faking the audience out, and then hitting you with an expected event. I liked the chilling state of suspense the film tried to keep us in.

The second reason why this movie is better than expected is the film's ending. Minor spoilers ahead, so stop reading if you haven't seen this movie. The movie's final scenes are so unexpected and offer such a crazy plot twist that I admit I sat up in my seat and said, "What??". Seriously, there was two questions marks in my utterance. It's a really, really cool twist that makes you rethink the entire film. I liked that.

While this film is better than the previous, that quality improvement is still relative. Final Destination 5 is still the second worst film of the franchise. The characters are once again lackluster. While I liked them more than the completely forgettable cast of the previous film, I still didn't really care about a single individual. I knew they were all going to die, one by one, and the movie never suggested why I should care. The death sequences are cool to watch, but they ultimately don't mean much when it doesn't matter who dies.

This film was pretty gruesome. This franchise has always pushed the limits, but I felt like some of the deaths here were particularly hard to watch. I squirmed in my seat a few times and wanted to look away. I don't think it needed to be that bloody, but I suppose they're trying to up the ante.

This is the second movie in the franchise to come out in 3D. It's not as awful or obnoxious as the last film, but the 3D scenes still look pretty stupid in 2D. This hurts the movie, but just slightly- those scenes didn't bother me nearly as much this time around.

Final Destination 5 was surprising for a number of reasons. It's still not a very good movie, but it at least improved on the previous installment. I still think this franchise has run out of steam, and once again, I'm hoping it will end with this film. However, I suspect we may get a few more of these movies before it's all said and done. I hope they can just continue to improve, because this movie still needed to be a lot better.

Rating 1-10
Tim's Rating: 6



If You Enjoyed This Movie, We Recommend: Final Destination, Final Destination 2, Final Destination 3, The Final Destination