> > On May 28, 4:16 pm, nick <nickmacpherso...@AOL.com> wrote:

> > > On May 28, 8:49 am, moviePig <pwall...@moviepig.com> wrote:> On May 28, 8:13 am, RichA <rander3...@gmail.com> wrote:

> > > > > I found it engaging.  Even the short homage to "It's Alive" was
> > > > > effective.  I believed the characters in this from the Russian tour
> > > > > guide to the adventurers, even the Leo DiCaprio (sort of) clone who
> > > > > gets attacked early on.  And for once, although there was a
> > > > > "government conspiracy" it didn't dominate the film, there was no evil
> > > > > leader pontificating on things here.  The fact the American audience
> > > > > didn't really like it doesn't surprise me, since it didn't end well
> > > > > and we know Americans (pathetically) need their precious happy
> > > > > endings.

> > > > Several well-regarded -- even found-footage -- movies have had downer
> > > > endings.  If there was a sin to this ending, it was sameness.

> > > I saw Chernobyl Diaries this afternoon.  A holiday, so even if CD is
> > > flopping (and while I haven't seen the box office results, I imagine
> > > it is) the theater was relatively full with a large number of high
> > > school girls and, depressingly, mothers with toddlers (toddlers who
> > > are probably cognizant enough to be scared out of their minds my the
> > > movie).    So maybe not the most ideal of viewing circumstances.  But
> > > while I thought it was generally well done and the first scare was
> > > about as good a jump scare as you're going to get these days, I'm
> > > getting tired of the downer endings in horror movies.

> > >  I don't know what Rich is talking about.  Mainstream horror movies
> > > have been having downbeat endings since Saw and Hostel right through
> > > the found footage pictures.  Even something as trad as The Woman in
> > > Black had a downbeat ending.  The audiences have come to expect it,
> > > but for once I would like a "precious happy ending" in a modern horror
> > > movie.

> > > One thing I learned from Chernobyl Diaries, or maybe I knew it
> > > already:  if you feel the need to say, "we need to get out of here
> > > before the radiation kills us," there's a good chance, one way or the
> > > other, you're going to die.

> > > Also despite the complaints last week about AMC, we only got two
> > > trailers, so between the start of the first trailer and the beginning
> > > of CD's end credits, it was a whopping eighty minutes.

> > Come to think of it, 'found footage' probably dates back to some
> > Elizabethan novel comprising a "discovered" diary (...and Trotsky's
> > right, the downer's almost a given).  Meanwhile, I hope you're
> > reminded of your happily-ever-after wish next time a horror movie
> > hands you one.  My trouble with CD's ending was that it hurled me back
> > to the HILLS HAVE EYES remake (where I didn't care for it either).

> The movie Chernobyl Diaries most reminded me of, not in its downbeat
> tone but more in its plot, was Raw Meat, the English 70s horror about
> cannibals in the London subway system; there's a movie that could do
> with a remake.