Shawn's The Ruins Review

2008 Movie # 43 - The Ruins

I haven't read the book upon which this movie is based but I had wanted to, and after watching the movie definitely still want to. It's very rare that I get to say this, but this is a horror movie that gets it fucking right. It's by no means perfect, but it's damn good and it's really a shame this it didn't make more money.

So what exactly do I mean when I say this is a horror movie that gets it right? Well let's count the ways that it actually gets it right. First off, the jump scares aren't bullshit "HEY I JUST BANGED ON THE WINDOW REALLY LOUD" sudden loud noise scares but actual well earned scares. Almost every horror movie relys on this old tired trick. The Ruins has jump scares yes, but they're actual scares and not just the character bumping into some jackass offscreen and having a loud noise play. I'm sure this weekend the Prom Night remake will be throwing a fuckload of those kinds of scares at us.

Next, we actually care about these characters. Most horror movies (see my Diary of the Dead review for more on this) are full of one dimensional characters who only exist so that they can be killed off. In this movie these characters (with one exception) are humanized and made into actual people. They also don't spend the entire running time making one fucking retarded decision after another. "Hey a weird noise outside, I better investigate. Don't you even think about giving me something to defend myself with!!!" You don't get a whole lot of that shit with this one. I'm sure we can count on the Prom Night remake to give us exactly the types of characters I just ranted against.

Third, this movie doesn't fuck around with the gore. This movie is rated R and it really shows. It's not gore for gore's sake either (well somewhat), like say the Saw movies seem to be now. In fact some of the worst things in this movie happen offscreen and are left to the imagination. But the stuff you see is fucked and at sometimes worthy of looking away from the screen. Again, I look forward to the PG-13 Prom Night giving us a lot of violence cut aways and tiny amounts of blood.

I could keep going but the point is, this is a horror movie that actually works which is getting rarer and rarer as time goes on. This is what horror should be. As you can also see I'm not the biggest fan of the Prom Night remake, despite of course not having seen it yet. I feel though it epitomizes everything that is wrong with the horror genre. See The Ruins, it will kick your ass.

****/5