'Blu-ray or Bust'
THE LAZARUS EFFECT (2015, PG-13, 83 minutes, BLUMHOUSE
PRODUCTIONS)
As “Quicksilver” in XMEN: DAYS OF FUTURE PAST, Evan Peters
had one of the most wonderfully executed and well scripted scenes in 2014.
He ran in slow motion around a room, modifying the
trajectory of bullets and fists and cookware. It was funny, it was thrilling.
It was a beautiful, meandering ballet with a suddenly violent and satisfactory
end.
Evan Peters is in THE LAZARUS EFFECT, and he has one of the
worst off-screen deaths ever. You don’t even realize he’s dead until a few
minutes later. It sucks.
Olivia Wilde was in a movie called DEADFALL, and she was
naked. She’s kinda hot. She showed decent acting chops in “House” and “The
Black Donnellys”. She, also, is in LAZARUS EFFECT. Not hot. Kinda sucky.
Ray Wise was in “24”. He was “The Devil” in the TV show
“Reaper”, and he was an Army general in BIG ASS SPIDER. The dude was in stuff
that just sounds cool. He is also in LAZARUS. And it still sucks.
See, this is what happens when a studio takes a worn out
idea, throws it into a contemporary setting, and says “make it PG-13”. You get
a big pile of suck. Billed as a “horror” film, they forgot to add the actual
horror to it... unless you like the same scare tactic repeated nine thousand
times in a movie. How many times have we seen the “don’t spin around because
you know she’s going to be RIGHT FREAKING BEHIND YOU” bit? And how many times
do we have to see it in the same flipping film? I’ll tell you: nine thousand.
Working on an experimental drug that brings the dead back to
life, a freak accident leaves a scientist dead, and her partner with the
ultimate dilemma: inject her with the drug, or be the douche-canoe that
couldn’t save Olivia Wilde? So she comes back, only she’s bad now, and starts
offing the small cast. Even though this flick is less than an hour and a half
long, she doesn’t kill fast enough for my taste. It would have been different
had this movie an “R” rating. It would have been different if the story wasn’t
so darned predictable.
You want a better movie? Go watch THE HOLLOW MAN, the film
this mess wants to be. Small group of people locked in a lab, one of ‘em is
nuts, and there is an unrated version (see: boobies). Also, a whole lot of
Special Features you may actually want to watch.
The downfall of LAZARUS is that you have a great cast, and
they all seem to really be into what they are doing, which is filming a crappy
script. The only rote scare tactic that was missing was a cat jumping down from
a cabinet. Can’t find a cat? Ooo, I know—have the guy turn around and she’s
RIGHT FREAKING BEHIND HIM!
I’d yawn, but I think I already disconnected my jaw with the
last one.
Film Grade: D
Special Features: (Who cares? Seriously. Unless the special
features are the cast talking about how great any other film on the planet is,
would you really want to waste your time?!?)
Blu-ray Necessary: Aw, hell no.
The Smartypants Spoiler Synopsis: dog dies, doc injects dog
with hooch, dog comes back as nasty dog; Olivia Wilde dies, doc injects Olivia
Wilde with hooch, Olivia Wilde comes back as nasty dog, kills everyone. Boom.
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