Dead in 3 days, 2006

A German horror this week, for a change. A gang of college students have just graduated and head off to a party to celebrate. During the day, they each receive a text saying, 'You'll be dead in 3 days'. They put it down to someone playing a prank...until one of gang goes missing! Tense, spooky, pretty gruesome and bloody in places. All round a solid horror. One thing bugged me the whole way through the film though, who does this blonde chick remind me of? And then it hit me, it's Elijah Wood AKA Frodo from Lord of the Rings...

SECOND OPINION: There are two types of low-concept horror in my eyes. Those that are simple, yet effective; and those that are just plain simple. All the Boys Love Mandy Lane is an example of the latter, but Dead in 3 Days just sneaks under the wire. Just. On the upside the deaths are imaginative and the characters suitably engaging. The story is believable and the perpetrator of the nastyness doesn't turn into Jason or Michael at anytime, which is refreshing for a what is ostensibly a slasher movie. On the downside the gang of merry victims do fall into the "let's do the dumbest thing we can think of" trap a little too often. Correct me if I'm incorrect, but when you only have 1 day left of your "3 days" and you're safe in a house with the police, you don't go looking for the killer. I don't anyway. They do. Duh!

We watched the dubbed version, which is a shame. I'm not keen on dubbed films because they change the words to fit the mouth movements, which seems like a vicious trade-off for the sake of learning how to read simple English. Anyway, the voice acting was very good on the whole and everything gelled very well. 

So a solid slasher movie with some inspired killings, but a few dodgy plot decisions too. Worth a watch all the same.