[Dead In Three Days]
Plot:In 3 days you're dead!" At first, Nina and her clique think this SMS is just a stupid joke. But no one is laughing when Nina's boyfriend is found tied to a concrete block at the bottom of a lake the next day. When another member of the group is savagely attacked everyone is paralyzed with dread. They're all on the murderers list. But why? Nina is the only one who discovers a mysterious clue leading to the brutal killer's identity. As the body count rises and the slaying become more and more vicious, still no-one believes her and time is running out.

Cast:Sabrina Reiter, Julia Rosa Stöckl, Michael Steinocher, Laurence Rupp, Nadja Vogel, Julian Sharp, Andreas Kiendl, Karl Fischer, Michou Friesz, Amelie Jarolim, Susi Stach, Michael Rastl, Konstantin Reichmuth.

My Thoughts:In three days, you're disappointed.

Review:"Dead In Three Days" is another slasher movie atmmept from Europe. The film follows a group of teens, who have recently graduated school. Their excitement over graduating, pasisng their finals, and being done with school is shot to hell however after they immediately begin receiving strange text messages warning them that each of them will die in three days. Now, the group...who decide to ignore the texts eventually come under attack. One by one, they are taken away and disappeared by a mysterious assailant.

Can they find out who wants them dead before they all become victims? Think "I Know What You Did Last Summer" meets "What Lies Beneath" with this film. Our killer has a penchant for dumping their victims into the middle of a freezing lake, and the text messages, along with one of the characters "fishy" line of work, gives the movie a few "IKWYDLS" overtones. Well, that and the director's costant need to keep the killer hidden from view until the very end. I have to admit, the movie does deliver a sense of dread which is very rare in slasher movies.

Most slasher movies have the happy, upbeat suburban vibe mixed in with the death and terror surrounding the characters. But this movie has a different vibe to it. The setting is a small town with not much going on, and a very dreary lakeside atmosphere. Definitely not a place where you'll find too much teen shikanery going on. Which is why the kids are so easily drawn into this mystery once one of their friends vanishes while at a party. It's not like they have much else to do anyways in this particular town.

The characters are pretty tolerable, which is a rareity for slasher movies. However, they are the cliche and standard "cool kids", the titular "in crowd"...even though most kids at their school, with the exception of a weird loner kid who's seen around the halls from time to time, seem to not give a crap about their popularity or exclusive clique. But nonetheless, the film portrays them as "the clique" to belong to, so the viewer is just forced to go with it. But the director of the movie is smart enough to not make them an obnoxious group at the same time.

For one thing, compared to the "in crowd"s you see in most american slasher movies, this bunch of kids are decent looking at best. In fact, here in the states...they probably wouldn't be looked upon as attractive enough to rule the school in a place like Beverly Hills, NYC, or any of this countries many small towns. But in Austria where the movie was filmed, they seem to be able to pass for "the hot kids". The movie has no great deaths, nor very intense and suspenseful moments, so it tries it's best to lure in the viewer with an exceptionally written murder/mystery plot. And for the most part it does work.

The movie really makes you want to know who is behind the texts, the killings, and who wants these kids dead. And of course, while their first suspicion is the weird loner kid who they assume wants to be like them, the film proves to be alot more complicated and intricate than "oh...it's that weird kid who's killing everybody." A godsend indeed. However, the movieis held back by it's lack of creativity when it comes to the murders. And you sort of wonder when is a really good death gonna come along.

But beyond one interesting and morbid death where a person is dumped into the lake, bound and gagged...there's nothing bloody or memorable here. But when the killer is finally revealed, it then all begins to make sense about the deaths and why they weren't so extremely gory. But the movie shoots itself in the foot with the reveal of the backstory regarding the killer and why they've decided to take this path of revenge against these particular kids.

Which is a shame because the whole text message subplot was a really good tool within the context of a slasher movie. And to see it be more effective in it's implementation than the killer is, is quite disappointing. Nonetheless, the film still manages to be break-even-decent because it atleast attempts to bring something new to the slasher movie table. And although it doesn't fully succeed..it doesn't totally fail either.

Positives:Some interesting and new wrinkles which are applied within the movies storyline, and the bound-and-gagged-lake-dump death.

Negatives:No real creative, bloody, or gory deaths. The moment where the killer is revealed is more strange, disappointing, and weird than scary. The killers motive can also be looked upon as a "meh" moment.

Overall:Two out of four stars.





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