Review of Vanishing on 7th Street (2010) by Shane H — 08 Jun 2011

Hayden Christensen is undeniably a very handsome young man and we've been watching him mature for some time now. Sadly, his acting chops seem to be suffering from some sort of extended adolescence. He just can't seem to find himself in a winning flick and I'm officially done looking for any external reasons. It's time for him to accept what I already know - acting is just not his thing. This was a potentially good movie, not great, but good. I was sold on it because John Leguizamo was in the credits and he has NEVER failed to amaze me even if he's in the thick of a truly awful film (Land of the Dead). Unfortunately for me, his participation in this film was limited and I was stuck watching Hayden play "Anakin - Scared of the Dark". I'm putting Directors on notice with Vanishing on 7th Street, if you have to include Hayden Christensen in your movie then for God's sake, place him somewhere in the background (preferably shirtless) and keep his mouth SHUT. That will draw your female audience and prevent the immediate annoyance of everyone concerned. Think of him as a modern day Fabio if you will. Everyone loves Fabio because he has no illusion that he's a good actor, he's just eye candy and he's knows it. So with Fabio we get to laugh with him rather than at him. Laughing at Hayden just makes me sad and this film ended up making me sad because of that. I've said my peace now, let's move on to the film itself.

On August 18, 1590 an artist and friend to Sir Walter Raleigh, named John White, arrived in the Roanoke, Virginia colony to find it devoid of all human life. No sign of a struggle, no damage, nothing...118 souls simply disappeared literally without a trace. The only clue was a single word carved into the fort - "Croatoan". On a nearby tree someone started to carve the same but never got past "Cro"...terrifying and puzzling indeed. This is the true life story from which "Vanishing on 7th Street" is drawn. Tragically for us, the true story is infinitely more interesting than Vanishing. In fact, this should have been a dramatization of that story (with maybe Russell Crowe in the lead) and it could have been a smash hit. Instead it's a rehash of every single "Stay in the Light!!!!" horror flick that we've been tortured with. If I have to watch something from this genre then I throw "Pitch Black" into the DVD player. Anyone remember the X-Files episode where Scully and Mulder got stuck in a cabin with a single lightbulb that stood between them an a swarm of water absorbing insects that left humans a dry husk??? That was more interesting than this movie and yes, I have that to watch over and over too.

It just occurred to me that perhaps the writers for Vanishing were so desperate to remain faithful to the true life story that they left out anything resembling a detail or even a hint as to what caused everyone to Vanish from Earth one night when the lights went out. Perhaps that would have worked had they stuck with that premise. Instead they started drifting into areas of faith, science and science fiction that are better served individually rather than through a nonsense cocktail of hibbiddy jibbiddy and that is the perfect summation of Vanishing "A nonsense cocktail of religion, science and science-fiction hibbiddy jibbiddy". Anyone??

So everyone vanishes and we're left with a handful of survivors who were lucky enough to be near a light source when the mysterious, random darkness "event" happened. The characters of the survivors are poorly drawn, personally and morally vague and just run around scared for 92 minutes. Yawn. We're saved 80 minutes in when Hayden gets poofed into nothingness and only a couple of kids with a horse are left to entertain us. Queue the credits and end music. LOL. Movie over. Wait, really? It's over? THAT'S IT!?? Yes, that's it. 92 minutes of wasted time. Google the Roanoke Colony story and get back those 92 minutes.

So why am I giving this a 60%? A few reasons. First, this is the only attempt at a "new" or "original" movie I've seen in a very long time. Everything, EVERYTHING now is either a sequel, a prequel or an "update" to a previously done movie. I loathe going to movies now and when I'm not forced to go with nieces, nephews and the lot to some animated or CGI nonsense, I go to Documentaries like "Cave of Forgotten Dreams" which was, for lack of a better word, awesome. Second, Vanishing left the "blue filter" in the closet where it belongs. One more high tension thriller using that device (Limitless) and I'm going to find and personally destroy every single blue filter on the planet. It RUINED "Lost Souls" for me and Winona Ryder was already doing such a lovely job of that. Third, watching it in the comfort of my home with the ability to dialogue with other people during the movie run made it very enjoyable. "Can you believe the fat clown in 'Spawn' was John Leguizamo??" Last, I wasn't angry at the end when Hayden finds the word 'Croatoan' on a bridge as he tries to escape the city...it encouraged me to look at the true story again bring that up in conversation over the coming weeks. Make no mistake, I can't recommend this movie to anyone, it's a disaster and drags painfully along at times. If you have 92 minutes of your life that you're not doing anything else with though, this won't kill you and you might actually learn something.