Silence of the Lambs, 28 Days Later, The Bone Collector

I recently saw three movies that are very similar. So why not talk about them altogether?

28 Days Later, a horror flick the movie employee picked out for me because it's "not so gory," tells a story very similar to that of Will Smith's recent film I Am Legend. The movie had enough of a story line to keep us interested until the end, if the special effects didn't quite match up to par. They had enough surprise moments to make me scream at least once. Although there is nudity in the beginning that is completely unneeded.

The Bone Collector, a less famous film starring Denzel Washington followed the story of a serial killer who leaves clues behind for a handicapped slueth to find via a rooky cop, played by Angelina Jolie. As usual, Denzel fills up the screen, and the clues left behind are very intriguing. However, the end is a little far fetched, to say the least.

Last, and probably most famous of the movies I've seen this week was Silence of the Lambs. With a very similar plot to The Bone Collector, Silence of the Lambs got more hype, and with good reason. Although the serial killer aspect of it is a teeny bit over the top (yeah it's creepy, but Buffalo Bill, a transvestite who kills fat women for their skins? Come on!) the acting was great. Jodie Foster plays her best role I've ever seen her do, but Anthony Hopkins steals the show. From the moment he appears on screen, Hopkins is the epitamy of creep. However, although the audience is perfectly aqcuainted with the fact that he eats other people, Hannibal Lecter is almost likeable. And his classic line at the end, "I'm having an old friend for dinner," comes off more as comical than creepy.

At the end of the week, part of me was happy, but part was a little disappointed with the movie making industry. Each of these movies was very entertaining. They all had fine acting, intruiging plots, and satisfying endings. But would I watch them again? Would I buy these movies and watch them over and over? Probably not. Perhaps I would watch Silence of the Lambs one last time, if only to see the performances of our two main heroes, but definitely not for the suspense brought on by Buffalo Bill, or the hokey bit about how Foster wants to save the women because she couldn't "silence the lambs" that her relative slaughtered when she was a child.

One thing these somewhat scary flicks had that new ones seem to have lost: They all have happy endings.

The Mist

I'm not a big fan of horror, but this seemed like a pretty tame, scifi thriller at most. And with a writer like Stephen King it's bound to have some sort of story line.

Wrong.

The special effects were downright laughable. The gore was over the top. And none of the "scary" ideas had any originality. Monstars implanted their offspring in people, like in Alien, spiders webbed people up like in Lord of the Rings, and flying insects reminded one of the computerized mosquitoes in Jumanji.

When the shadow of any type of plot finally appeared, it portrayed an antagonistic, cliche fanatic who looks to the warnings in Revelation and sees the monsters in the mist as the wrath of God punishing sinful unbelievers. This unstable Christian demands blood sacrifices and preaches lengthy sermons about sinners and "the creatures of Hell."

And who was to blame for all this massacre and madness? You got it folks, the American Soldier. While the Christian rallied a crowd of followers, and the "good guys" fought overwhelmingly fake looking monsters, the three soldiers stood in the back ground quietly. Finally they are proven to have caused the coming of the monsters, inciting two of them to shamefully commit suicide and one to be, "fed to the beasts."

As if this was not bad enough, the very end of the movie was, absolutely and utterly pointless, hopeless, and anticlimatic.

With a horrible plot, ignorant representation of Christians, outrageously wussy American soldiers, and a royally screwed up ending, Stephen King has created quite a masterpiece. All hail the king of horror!

As its trailer suggests, Never Back Down is a movie about fighting for what you believe in, if a little cliche at parts. Going into it, I expected to see an array of coreographed fight scenes strung together by a storyline so weak that my twelve year old sister could have written it. However, with only two intense, painfully realistic looking fight scenes, the movie took on more of a Rocky feel than that the mindless violence of Fight Club (or at least what we thought Fight Club was going to be) or The Greenstreet Hooligans.

The story follows hot-head teenager Jake Taylor, played by the rookie Sean Faris, with a natural silver screen pizzaz and a striking resemblance to Tom Cruise. Jake is forced to move to a high school in Orlando, Florida with his younger brother and recently widowed mother (played by 24's Leslie Hope). While at school, Jake meets the beautiful Baja, who lures him to the hottest party around, where he finds a culture of high school students who's primary entertainment is to watch kids fight, and where the most popular man on campus is the one with the most victories under his belt. He is soon challenged by Ryan McCarthy, the king of the ring and master of mixing martial arts with brute street fighting.

After receiving the beating of a lifetime in front of the entire school and his new love interest, Tyler determines to get revenge, and seeks training from the town legend, played by Blood Diamond's Djimon Hounsou. However, the movie takes an unnexpected twist when Tyler transforms from an angry teenager with a guilty conscience and injured pride, to a man determined to stop the bullying of the campus villain.

While the story does have some unrealistic and somewhat predictable aspects, the characters possess surprisingly noble motives, and the movie portrays messages that are somewhat deep for a high school fight movie, without being overly corny. With well developed characters, talented actors, and a pretty climactic final showdown, all pulled together with a decent storyline, Never Back Down may not be nominated for any awards, but it is definitely worth seeing.