[Catacombs]
Plot:A young woman named Victoria heads to France to visit her wild sister Carolyn. One night, Victoria attends the Parisian underground rave scene, which is literally under ground within the city’s Catacombs,which is a 200-mile labyrinth of ancient limestone tunnels under Paris lined with the remains of 7 million people. Soon, Victoria finds herself lost in the darkness, pursued by someone or something lurking within the darkness.

Cast:Alecia Moore, Shannyn Sossamon.

My Thoughts:What......the - fuck?

Review:Yeah, it's a wonder why "Catacombs" didn't make it into theaters. I mean the movie had everything going for it right? Two good loking female leads like Shannyn Sossamon, and Alicia Moore (Pink), a rave held in a dark underground maze, and a monster on the loose. Uh, scratch that...everything going for it, except...the fact that it TOTALLY SUCKS! "Catacombs" follows Victoria (Sossamon) who is sent a postcard by her sister Carolyn(Moore) asking that she come to France and party with her. Victoria agrees, and when she meets up with her sister in Paris, Carolyn decides to take Victoria to a rave in the cities underground catacombs, a place where 7 million bodies were buried way back when the French ran out of space to bury their dead.

In a scenario like this, a writer has so much gold and riches at his or her or their disposal. But leave it to this films writer to fuck it all up. The movie starts off with alot of promise, and not much time is spent on the characters. Other than Victoria and Carolyn, the pic doesn't spend alot of time introducing the other players who are really just footnotes so to speak in this particular movie. Execept for a character named Jean-Michelle (who names their kid Jean-Michelle, even in France?). A morbid guy who has an obsession with death, and tells the sisters a creepy story about a cult from way back when who created the ultimate hulking evil maniac and let him loose in the underground tunnels.

Then it moves on to the underground rave where again, things are sped up to get to the real good shit, which is supposed to be (remember this term..."supposed to be") a psychotic demon/devil like monster stalking the subterranean catacombs searching for new victims and fresh meat. But instead, this film pushes ahead quickly to get to a whole lot of NOTHING! If you've seen other horror films where clueless girls run around screaming their heads off for 90 minutes with it all amounting to absolutely nothing, then you've already seen "Catacombs". That's all this movie is really, a whole lot of nothing.

Once Sossamon's character gets lost in the maze of underground tunnels, after turning down a poolside orgy with her sister and a few of the rave guys, the movie does show some signs of hope, having her get chased by what could possibly be the creature mentioned from Jean-Michelle's story. But in reality, it's all a smokescreen. This alleged creature does nothing really, and while the film starts off with a chase scene which sets up the later main chase scene involving Sossamon's character, there's never any point in this movie where we get splatterrific gore, blood, or violence.

Sossamon's character, running at 1 mph no less somehow manages to continue to evade her pursuer throughout the duration, and it's as if he doesn't want to really hurt or catch her. Too bad for me, I didn't catch on to the bullshit this movie was spewing out at the very beginning, but once the ending came, man I wish I had been more quick on what to expect. Or maybe the writer just did a good enough job of masking future events until the extremely disappointing final reveal where we learn MANY things, all of which are one disappointment after another. Fans of Shannyn Sossamon will like this movie, male or female.

I mean, if you think she's hot, or if you see her as a talented actress...then you'll just love watching her run, scream, then fall...then run again, and scream, and yell "get away from me!", or "Leave me alone!", like 30 times for 90 whole excruciating minutes. Because...THAT'S ALL CATACOMBS amounts to! Seriously, if you're thinking this movie has a good death or two, or three, smack that thought out of your head right now! It's just Sossamon on the run, underground, wet, sweaty, and terrified. The only twist in this horrible film is Sossamon's character coming across some dirty looking hermit while she's running around like a chicken with her head cut off underground.

But that doesn't even scratch the surface of this retarded film, as Carolyn apparently wanted to take her sister to this underground rave in a maze full of mummified corpses to help her "loosen up a bit". Wow, I wish I had a sister who was so critically uninformed. I guess she must also see this as a theraputic method for traumatized children as well. "Catacombs" does have one bright spot to it though, the ending of the film, which kind of mirrors how I felt after this travesty was over. Just like one of the films surviving characters, I felt like taking an axe and smashing away at something myself...LIKE THE DVD OF CATACOMBS!

Positives:The frikkin nuts ending, it really categorized how I felt once this shit was over. The underground maze of catacombs was also very creepy, and awesome looking, albeit wasted because the script was so poor.

Negatives:Bad script, no blood or gore, a terrible twist ending from a dialogue standpoint, not an action standpoint, and an overall aura of total lameness!

Overall:Do yourself a favor, if your friends drop by with "Catacombs" on dvd for you to watch together, run and hide underground and don't come out until they agree to return it to the video store immediately!





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