Review of Dread (2009) by Davis B — 22 Apr 2010

I was really looking forward to this, since "Dread" is one of my favorite stories in the amazing "Books of Blood" series. It is a good film, well acted, well directed, but the best way to describe it is to compare it to a stone skipping across water, every once in a while it touches on the original story, but misses the mark in the end.

The film makers could have concentrated on the central ideas of the short story and spent a majority of the film watching the "imprisoned" character, which I feel, would have dragged the film into "Saw/Hostel" territory. So, they concentrated more on the psychological problems the characters have. The main plot of the story doesn't really show up until the last 20 minutes, and it is very faithful, but the last third of the story (and the best part) is completely missing, replaced with a generic revenge fantasy and "twist" ending.

So, overall, a well made film that didn't really work as well as it should. This is my least favorite of the latest Clive Barker films, after "Book of Blood" and "Midnight Meat Train".