Chain Letter

Chain Letter (2010)

** (out of 4)

Rather routine slasher has a group of friends getting a chain letter e-mail saying that if they don't pass it along they'll die. The group all delete it and soon enough they start getting killed. If you've ever seen a slasher movie in your life then this here really isn't going to offer anything you haven't already seen. The one gimmick is that the killer is stalking the people through their phones and other online devices but this really doesn't add up to much nor does the mystery of who the killer really is. While watching CHAIN LETTER I couldn't help but feel like I was watching a film where the writer and director didn't know too much about the genre and before making the film they watched several recent horror movies and tried to copy them. It's obvious from the violence and gore level that someone had watched the SAW films as several of the deaths are quite lavished and built up to something a normal person couldn't do. The death scenes are at least done in good fashion as they are quite graphic at times and the make-up department doesn't play shy with the red stuff. Those wanting gore are going to get quite a bit of it here but sadly these scenes are spread out through the running time so there are a lot of dry moments with nothing much happening. The mystery of who the killer is really never grabs the viewer so trying to unveil that is never as much fun as it should have been. The performances are actually better than average and we get small roles from Keith David and Brad Dourif and it's always nice to see them. CHAIN LETTER also goes for some "flashy" style that just never works. In the end, there are certainly much better films out there but this one here needed a touch of life and energy to make it more memorable than it actually is.