[Solstice]
Plot:A young girl discovers some terrifying secrets about her twin sister who commited suicide a few months earlier.

Cast:Elizabeth Harnois, Shawn Ashmore, Tyler Hoechlin, R. Lee Ermey, Amanda Seyfried.

My Thoughts:Flawed yet decent.

Review:"Solstice" is another direct to dvd effort which tries to make the A-typical ghost story interesting, scary, and clever. While the film doesn't bring anything new to the table, it does manage to atleast be a decent and likeable experience, which doesn't cause the viewer any pain by watching a tragically bad movie. The film revolves around a young girl named Megan (Elizabeth Harnois) who's twin sister Sofie (also played by Harnois) commited suicide awhile earlier.

Now, she and her friends visit an old house in the country to have some fun, but the time of the visit just happens to fall around Solstice time, a time where the living can commune with the dead. And it just so happens that Megan's sister Sofie seems to be trying to contact her during this period in time, from the dead, to either warn her or threaten her. For those who don't know of Elizabeth Harnois, she starred in the short lived FOX show "Point Pleasant", a show which ironically enough...dealt with the supernatural.

She does an excellent job in this film, pulling double duty as the lead female Megan, and her dead twin sister Sofie. The one thing this film brings to the table is a talented young cast which helps it along the way, even during those boring or uninteresting moments. Led by Harnois, the film also stars Shawn Ashmore (X-MEN The Last Stand), and Amanda Seyfried (Veronica Mars). This talented young cast puts on excellent performances which keeps the movie from sinking too deep during those times when nothing really intriguing is happening.

Had this film been casted with no-namers or new actors just breaking into movies, I could've been in for a long 90 minutes. Luckily...it wasn't. The film doesn't rely heavily on scares, blood, or trippy visuals like most ghost stories come to life do, but rather relies more on it's story...and Harnois carrying out her role as Megan who shares a connection to everything that happens. This formula works, oddly enough...and when the spectre moments do occur, they maange to work well enough, although none are genuinely scary. They do however manage to serve a purpose, and be trippy enough to fit in with the story.

The basic gist of the film is to figure out why Megan's twin sister is trying to contact her from beyond, but the movie, written by Ethan Erwin, and Marty Musatov...takes alot of twists and turns during it's final act, which bring the supporting cast deeper into the story and eventually put them in the thick of things. This is not the norm for most ghost stories, which have a ghost scaring the shit out of people left and right until the end upon which we find out someone did something very bad, and the ghost wants them to pay for it.

This movie takes a different approach, mixed with the same old same old. The new approach, being that the ghost of Sofie sticks to gently haunting her twin sister, and the same old being her friends trying to convince her that there's no ghost anywhere around, and that she's nuts. Although this usually becomes an annoyance in films like this, in the case of "Solstice"...the writers make sure not to overdo the "Megan you're insane" chatter from the friends, which keep the film from falling too far into clichedom.

R. Lee Ermey makes a cameo as a local redneck, who may or may not have a hand in the spooky going ons in the area, and while Ermey has limited screentime, and his characters is alot more mellow from Sheriff Hoyt in the "TCM" movies..his character is embedded into the film well enough to the point where he's relevant, and doesn't just feel like a cameo added to the movie for the sole purpose of scoring some more dvd rentals and or purchases. "Solstice" finishes up nicely, with an ending that doesn't exactly pack a punch, but does pack some juicy twists, surprises, and developments.

"Solstice" is not a great film, and does have it's share of problems, but for a direct-to-dvd ghost story, it manages to provide some decent entertainment for a boring Saturday or Sunday afternoon. If you like your ghost movies scary as hell, this one isn't for you. But if you like them to rely more on story and performances over scares, you might wanna check "Solstice" out.

Positives:Great performances all around, good story, smart story, and a good ending.

Negatives:Sometimes the film drags and overdoes it with the dialogue. There are some moments where scares should've replaced talking.

Overall:Decent ghost story.





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