Review of My Soul to Take (2010) by James S — 20 Aug 2013

You know when some new music craze comes along and an older band will try to adapt their music so it fits with this new hip sound, ultimately alienating their long standing fan base and recruiting zero new, younger fans in the process? It can happen to film directors too.

Wes Craven is a horror legend. He gave us Nightmare on Elm Street (which although it's only a semi-decent horror, it's effect is phenomenal), he gave us the Scream movies and now he shovels up My Soul To Take, a quick fire, Twitter-esque slasher that is near painful to watch. It's the dubstep of modern horror movies.

The first ten minutes are an exhausting experience, and not in the terror filled way. A serial killer with dual personalities is slain on the same night that seven new babies are born and years later they carry out a ritual to ensure that his soul remains buried, possibly in one of the seven. It's ridiculous and any tension goes out the window when the Rob Zombie lookalike killer is unveiled during the first death scene.

There's a decent range of stereotype characters and perhaps one unexpected plot twist along the way but writing this now, I cannot recall any of the other kill sequences apart from the first one. They leave so little impression and that's a real failing when it comes to horror.

The film does little to scare and is so lazy in this respect that it tries to pull that open the mirrored cupboard, close the mirrored cupboard, ARGH! There's someone there trick twice in the space of twenty minutes. Come on Wes.....you gave us Ghostface turning around on Drew Barrymore in the window, one of the best scares of all time. You can do better than this.

Boring, ill-connected and a pain in the eyes to watch, My Soul To Take is a step in the wrong direction.