Final Destination (2000)

Cast includes:
CHARACTER	ACTOR/ACTRESS	RATING
Alex Browning	Devon Sawa
Clear Rivers	Ali Larter
Carter Horton	Kerr Smith	½
William Bludworth	Tony Todd
Ms. Valerie Lewton	Kristen Cooke
Billy Hitchcock	Seann William Scott

Review

Most things about James Wong's Final Destination is most unfortunate. This is a film spoiled by a lack of shrewdness and flair in the writing process. There are interesting elements in here, but every time you might think the film is heading for something good, it is spoiled by surprisingly bad choices.

The premise explores the idea of fate and predetermination, proposing that death is never accidental, but rather part of a larger plan or design. This is a concept which the human race have been fascinated by for centuries, and early on in Final Destination, it seems that Wong and co. might have something with which to fuel this fascination. The movie's first part, with Sawa's vision inside the plane, is harrowing and thought-provoking, but we're quickly put off by the introduction of a subplot that is mostly concerned with suspicion and animosity towards the Sawa character. An angle kept through most of the film, and that seems both out of place and unmotivated considering the fact that this kid has saved a lot of people's lives. It reduces many of the supporting roles to caricatures that you'd might think had disappeared with the Rambo movies. And it doesn't help the case that the acting is nowhere near good enough to justify these strange (to say the least) interpersonal relations.

As Final Destination approaches its final destination, it becomes increasingly more apparent that, although Alex's visions continue, the filmmaker's visions dry out. The film is reduced to a cliched horror flick which effectively removes the potential existential discussions that the start of the film suggested. In Wong's conclusion, the premise of death is not only decided by fate, but more (or less) impressively descends on us as a Scream-type serial killer. I predict that most viewers will fairly quickly reject Final Destination, and as the ending approaches, we're closing in on ridicule.