About.com Rating
Growing up, the scariest part of playing a board game for me was landing in Monopoly jail without a shank, but horror movies today have discovered the untapped fright potential of Milton Bradley and the Parker Brothers. Case in point: on the heels of the Eliza Dushku evil board game movie Open Graves comes the similarly plotted The Black Waters of Echo's Pond, which, unlike its SyFy-aired predecessor, is receiving a theatrical release.
The Plot
In 1927, archaeologists exploring a 4th century BC Greek tomb devoted to Pan, "the god of panic," discover the remnants of a board game that they piece together and bring back to the US. On the way, it becomes apparent that something evil's afoot, and the entire party ends up dead -- the last remaining survivor hiding the game on a secluded island to prevent it from ending up in anyone else's hands.
Eighty years later, a group of nine young adults gathers on the island for a weekend of partying, and guess what they find in the basement of their vacation home? That night, they gather around and play the antique game, taking turns rolling the dice and reading aloud instructions on the game cards. The instructions are provocative -- asking them to reveal secrets, accept dares and confess indiscretions -- arousing petty jealousy, resentment, lust and hatred that turns the players against one another in increasingly violent mayhem. For the love of Zathura!
The End Result
There's little in The Black Waters of Echo's Pond that horror fans haven't seen before.
Even without the prior release of Open Graves, it follows in the archetype of cult classics The Evil Dead and Night of the Demons, with a group of fun-loving kids holed up in a house who become possessed and turn on one another in grisly fashion. While it has some nice gore effects, however, Black Waters certainly isn't in the class of either Evil Dead or Night of the Demons and in fact more closely aligns with the SyFy-level quality of Open Graves.
The cast is an odd mishmash of recognizable veteran actors -- Robert Patrick (Terminator 2), Danielle Harris (Halloween IV and V), James Duval (Donnie Darko, May), Richard Tyson (There's Something About Mary, Big Bad Wolf) -- and newcomers whose command of the English language is dubious. The latter in particular tend to hurt the movie's believability (which is already in doubt from modest production values), although they're probably more appropriate for this level of film, which, let's face it, isn't exactly Shakespeare.
Director Gabriel Bologna's previous work on "mockbuster" specialist Asylum's 30,00 Leagues Under the Sea should give you an indication of his derivative style, which generates few scares and despite ample opportunity for over-the-top insanity, misses the chance to instill an Evil Dead-like kinetic energy into the film. Instead, it plods along, going through the genre motions that we've seen time and time again.
The characters are standard horror fodder, with single defining characteristics (the prude, the slut, the jerk, the jock, etc.) that don't endear them to the viewer. Sure, we know they're going to die anyway, but it would be nice to at least have some character quirks or some clever, lighthearted banter to add some semblance of depth. With a musical score that's similarly canned, it seems that the most complicated aspect of The Black Waters of Echo's Pond is its elongated title.
That said, the film as a whole -- including most of the actors -- is competent, there is a solid level of gore (including an ever-welcome chainsaw), and there are enough intriguing elements in the script to keep your attention. There's even a nice twist ending that, while not original, puts a palatable bow on the story.
The Skinny
- Acting: C (A few actors stand out for the wrong reasons.)
- Direction: C- (Perfunctory and lacking in scares.)
- Script: C (Shallow and unoriginal but competent.)
- Gore/Effects: B- (Some decent gore.)
- Overall: C (A been-there-done-that affair that's more appropriate on SyFy than the theater.)
The Black Waters of Echo's Pond is directed by Gabriel Bologna and is rated R by the MPAA for horror violence and gore, language, drug use and some sexuality/nudity. Release date: April 9, 2010.
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