'The Messengers' - A Movie Without A Message
By: Tim - aurora - Dunn

There's an urban legend that claims no good movie premiers in February. The big movies campaigning for Oscar gold have all finally come and gone. The summer run now comes in an early spring rush followed by a small lag then picks up again at the end of April. This leaves February as the proverbial dead zone. So why not throw out a horror flick to fill that dead zone?

Well that's where 'The Messengers' comes in as a horror flick with trailers promising something big filled with ghostly specters only a child can see and attacking birds reminiscent of the Hitchcock great. The first few minutes of this movie truly makes you think, 'Wow something good can come out in February'. The movie starts in a black and white montage, with wonderful film grain post work I might add, showing the horrific massacre of a family in an old house centering highly on an older daughter and a young son. After the build up of adrenaline and hopes that this might just be a worthwhile movie we sit excited to see more.

Cut to present day as Roy (Dylan McDermott) is driving to their new home after selling what little they had left in Chicago. Yes, you guessed it, this house happens to be the one shown in those opening minutes. Along with Roy is his wife Denise (Penelope Ann Miller), teenage daughter Jess (Kristen Stewart) and young son Ben (Evan & Theodore Turner). Roy brings his family back to North Dakota where he grew up as a kid in order to start a new life farming sunflowers. The house is turn of the century, as in the last century, and has had little to no up keep to it since maybe the 1950's or so, making it the perfect place to film a haunt house story. Happily it does not take long before the little ghosties pop up and start harassing Jess. Although it is young Ben, who can not, or at least will not, speak that is the only one that sees them directly.

We immediately see that there is a lot of tension between mom and daughter but as to what or why that is you are left clueless till near the end of the movie. Dad seems to be the mediator of the family, the one stuck trying to hold them all together in a catch-22 family war. In their first trip into town for Roy to buy crop seed and supplies, Jess takes a look see in town where she meets her would be hero Bobby (Dustin Milligan), all teenage girls seem to require one in the movies. Dad seems to care for his daughter and even teases her about going back to get Bobby's phone number for her as they are driving back home.

Back at the farm mom is busy trying to scrub a nasty stain off a wall which keeps popping back up through out the movie. Ben sees ghosts fluttering under sheets, crawling on the ceiling and well everywhere. Here is where the movies starts to unravel and does so quickly. Ben does not seem afraid of the nasty, ugly ghosts but acts more like the little boy from 'Close Encounters' with glee and excitement making you wonder just what the heck is going on in this speechless kids head. Jess finds a pocket watch that refuses to open for her and witnesses several more bumps in the day (these specters are diffidently not afraid of the sun.) Outside dad meets a grifter, John (John Corbett) looking for work and is quickly hired on to help Roy get started.

Roy and Denise need to run into town leaving, grudgingly with mom, Jess alone with Ben. Once alone an all out poltergeist party begins scarring the living daylights out of Jess, but again leaving Ben more amused then anything else. John comes to the rescue and helps Jess and Ben escape from the house. A house which seconds before was utterly trashed but now is good as new if not cleaner. This and another later attack on Jess which sends her to the hospital, leaves mom and dad questioning what the heck is going on with Jess believing that she is both inflicting harm on herself and making the whole mess up. Jess herself is confused and not sure if shes going insane or not.

At this point we are still lost as to what happened to cause the family to leave Chicago, although we do learn they lost most everything due to some accident with Ben. But this is not the only thing which still is not explained even after 3/4 of the movie is over already. We know nothing about the ghostly residents, or why crows turn into evil attacking flying wraiths, or who John really is. This drags out for several more minutes till Jess finally learns the secret of who John is and finally the whole family is attacked. A few short minutes later the movie is over and everything and everybody, including the crows are all right and good now.

This movie started out with great promise. The down fall is that after the initial fright scenes you are in need of a story to carry you through the rest of the movie and there is no story. They try to make you think there is but it just never materializes. You do realize that Roys family mimics the previous residents of the house. The events that torture Jess, and humor Ben, seem to parallel the massacre we see at the beginning. What the heck is it that causes the birds to flock and attack. Does Bobby really get paid for the intensly small roll he plays? What causes the ghosts to wigout and attack. Where is the story to tell us whats happening? Plus without a strong story as a base the development of the characters is all but non-existent. Its sad because this movie started with high hopes then quickly falls to a mellow cross between 'The Ring' and 'The Grudge' and ends as a cheap 5 cent remake of 'The Shinning'.

The visual effects in the movie, what few there are nicely done. Nothing new nor truly extraordinary but at least they provided enough to make this movie bearable. The sad part is it seems this movie, both in story as well as cinematography and effects gets divide in two. The first half being well done while the second half almost seems like it was picked up by others at a later time and forced to be finished just to get it out of the way.

Conclusion:
I think the greatest witness to how this movies fares is based on the title, 'The Messengers'. Anybody ever see the old chic flick called 'Bed of Roses'? This romance movies trailer, movie poster and title all centered around a bed covered in rose petals. Yet some how the very thing that this movie was centered on, a bed of roses, was never part of the movie. Likewise, 'The Messengers' leaves you asking, who the heck or what the heck are the messengers? There's no messengers in this movie, there's almost no sense in this movie at all and the climax, well where the heck did that disappear to? While the filming of the movie was well done it just was not enough to carry this movie all the way to the end.

My suggestion for seeing this movie is this, if you have not seen 'Pans Labyrinth' yet go see it instead. If you have and you still want to see this movie, make sure to soak in the first half of the movie to keep you there through the end.

Ratings:

IMDB Film Ratting - Not rated at this time

- For a movie going experience I give it: 2 out of 5 stars.
The movie starts off great but fizzles quickly midway through and finally collapses at the end.

- For a technical piece of CG and VFX work I give it: 2.5 out of 5 stars.
I'd be tempted to give it a higher score if the story had given us more and better scenes to work with. If you've seen 'The Ring' and/or 'The Grudge' then you have seen the ghost effects already.

Credits: