Lights Camera Dead (2007) - By Duane L. Martin

Film Reviews: Lights Camera Dead (2007) - By Duane L. Martin
Posted on Saturday, February 28, 2009 @ 23:05:00 Mountain Standard Time by Duane

Ryan Black (Wes Reed) and Steven Didymus (J.C. Lyra) have a dream. They want to make this fabulous horror flick. The problem? Lack of talent, a competent crew and a decent story. This causes them to take forever trying to shoot the thing, and after having enough of the temper tantrums and insults from the director, everyone up and leaves. After editing what they have, the film ends up being nothing more than a short. An argument with the editor leads to Ryan and Steven killing him, which gives them an idea. Make a real horror movie! To that end, they invite their cast and crew back to an old farmhouse out in the middle of nowhere for the "premiere" of the film, which is actually just a ruse to get them all out there so they can go on a killing spree, while filming the whole thing for their masterpiece.

Now, for a movie to be good, it has to have a combination of things all working in conjunction to create an enjoyable result. The first thing is has to have is a good story. Unfortunately, not only has this type of story been done before, but it's been done in a better, more entertaining way, such as with Paul Solet and Jake Hamilton's, "Means to an End". Being original isn't everything, but if you're doing something that's been done before, or at least something similar to something that's been done before, you need to really make the story stand on its own, so people will compare other films to yours, not yours to other people's. Unfortunately, the story in this film just doesn't stand out all that much amongst the crowd, not is it all that memorable.

Another thing you need to create a great film is to match a really good cast with well written characters. You need to be able to care about the people you're watching on screen, and to identify with them to a point where it immerses you into the story. The cast in this film were for the most part just ok, as were the roles that were written for them, with two notable exceptions. J.C. Lyra's portrayal of uppity screenwriter Steven Didymus was really amusing. He was so dedicated to his story, and such a bitch about the shallowness he felt the director was bringing to it, that he ended up being a really entertaining character. The other exception was the director's girlfriend Kari, played by Amy Lollo. She made her character believable and brought a naturalness to the role that really made it work. The fact that she's really beautiful didn't exactly hurt things either, but that's beside the point. She's a great actress, and I hope to see more from her in the future.

Lastly, a film needs to be technically sound. For the most part, this film was well made. Much of it was done in dark areas or outside at night, yet the lighting never became an issue. The scenes were all lit properly and clearly visible without being over-done to the point where it became artificial. The sound was good throughout the film as well. Most if not all of the dialogue in this film was clearly audible and easily understood. The editing moved the film along at a decent pace, and while there were scenes that could have been shortened a bit, that was a script issue, not an editing issue. The camera shots were all set up just fine, but there wasn't really anything memorable or notable about the camera work.

Basically what we have here is a film that, for me, never rose above the level of just being ok. It has some amusing moments and some decent gore here and there, but overall, there's nothing really all that memorable about it. The thing is, it's not that bad of a film, but it could have been better. Honestly, I think some more work on the script to beef up some of the characters and re-work some of the story would have gone miles towards making this a far better and more entertaining film, but as it stands now, for me anyway, it was just ok.

If you'd like to find out more about this film, you can check out the film's website at http://www.lightscameradead.com.