Rites of Passage

THE FINAL RITES (aka RITES OF PASSAGE) is a very strange little movie. It involves a group of high school students who are being taught about esoteric Native American drugs by their slick teacher. One of the students has an elder brother who experiments with these narcotics, which turns him into a psychopath. Inevitably a group of the students go away for the weekend for a beach holiday and find themselves being menaced by all and sundry.

There's a definite sense here that the story was being made up as they went along. Certainly it seems to make little sense and by the end it's fallen apart entirely, so the "narrative" consists of characters killing each other off until only the final survivors are left. The first half of the film, which is the build up, is actually mildly enjoyable, so it's a pity that the it goes absolutely nowhere come the end.

Three famous faces are mixed up in this mess. Wes Bentley plays virtually the same likable loner/weirdo character as he did in American BEAUTY. Stephen Dorff shows up as a cool teacher who's down with the kids, and strips off to show his buff body when required. Then there's an almost unrecognisable Christian Slater, hilariously playing a demented psychopath who just wants to kill everybody. His interactions with a sock puppet bring to mind the PG Tips adverts in the UK starring Johnny Vegas and Monkey. It's all very silly and relatively bloodless, meaning there's not much here for the viewers.

Rites of Passage is a flawed piece of filmmaking about a college dweeb trying to prove his manhood to his peers by dragging two van loads of his peers plus a professor (played by Stephen Dorff in a nothing role) out on a field trip to his family home in order to observe ancient Indian land on his property and take ancient Indian hallucinogens.

In the meantime, his disturbed brother (Wes Bentley) is almost as obsessed with finding a woman as he is with Native American history. He, along with his deranged, grieving grounds keeper (Christian Slater), have been cooking, using, and selling the hallucinogenic flowers as well. Of course, it's bad news when these two unstable characters run up against a bunch of pretty young students, especially when a tragic coincidence turns out to link them in an unexpected way.

The short review of this movie is that it sucks. Essentially, it's just an overcomplicated dead teenager movie with an above average cast. In one of the few highlights of the movie, scream queen Brianna Evigan pops up in a smallish part and spends most of her screen time in her underwear. In fact, most of the actresses are either in their underwear or bikinis for most of the movie but there's no actual nudity. Not much gore, either. And the characters aren't remotely likable so this is the sort of movie where you're hoping for everyone to die but disappointed when the death scenes are generic, mostly bloodless and generally forgettable.

Rites of Passage is all over the place, silly, and kind of pointless. It's not really an anti drug movie, it's not hardly scary, and it's not often funny. The only entertainment value comes from Christian Slater's crazy, over-the-top acting as he scrambles around waving a shotgun, muttering to himself, and hallucinating. Basically, imagine Tucker and Dale vs. Evil made without any of the wit.

While this movie is no award winning film, it does seem to get audiences attention. From beginning to end the film keeps a fast and thrilling pace, which help my attention. I was lucky enough to hear the directors speak in person, so I consider my self a little bias after really liking then men who made the film. In terms of the actual quality of the movie I think it was a fairly good movie. Definitely marketed towards a younger crowd. Includes a lot of sex, drugs, and partying so if your are into that you will find this movie entertaining. Also, the film includes a lot of blood and murder, so if you like funny thrillers it is the film for you. Would I buy a copy to own? Probably not. But it was enjoyable to watch since it was filmed in Isla Vista, where I currently live. All in all Rites of Passage is a goofy thriller good for a night in with popcorn, and a few laughs.

Peter Iliff has come a long way since his first successful screenplay, Point Break. His new film, Rites of Passage, is a complete departure from the Hollywood norm. The film focuses around a group of friends in Santa Barbara who take a lot of drugs and trip out on some ranch. The film is clearly directed towards a younger audience, and for the budget they were given, I think they did a great job. There isn't much past the surface of the film, but it works great as a popcorn thriller that I enjoyed with my friends. It was great to see all of the recognizable spots around Isla Vista and SB where Rites of Passage was shot. Would I watch it again? Maybe not. But it was certainly an entertaining and relevant film for a college student like myself.

Attempting to visit an authentic Indian burial ground for research, a group of students partying away at the site run afoul of a demented killer looking to punish them for a past indiscretion and forcing them to fight him off to get out alive.

This here turned out to be quite a misguided effort, mainly because so much of it really doesn't gel together the way it is. The premise of turning a haunted burial ground into a slasher is quite novel and generates much of the positives toward this, but the fact that the killer is absolutely pathetic, generates no fear or suspense from his physical appearance since he's essentially a homeless person for all intents and purposes and runs around with a shotgun, not a true slasher weapon which relegates all the kills to gunshot wounds or merciless pounding with a foreign object, greatly reducing the gore quotient here that could've saved this. The constant drug use allows for a few freaky hallucinations from time-to-time but the vast majority of the time nothing substantial happens during the trip, rendering it quite curious as to why it was featured as it was and why there was a huge furor from the characters to include it, so overall this has way too many problems. Even more ridiculous is the animated talking sock puppet giving the lead advice, a tactic that tries to make this a comedy but fails miserably as it comes off as incredibly lame more than anything, and it really only has a few isolated individual moments where it approaches watchability to make this enticing.

Rated R: Continuous pervasive drug use, Graphic Language, Graphic Violence and Brief Nudity.