From Within (2008)

Redundant and unnecessary.

Captivating movie !

best movie i've ever seen.

When a movie has you begging for it to end not even half way through it's pure crap. We've all seen this movie and this characters millions of times, nothing new in it. Don't waste your time.

The portrayal of Christians in this movie is so bad that you would have to be entirely ignorant of the religion to suspend your disbelief. You have Church members beating other people up, lying, fornicating, kidnapping, and committing all manner of violent crimes, and not despite their religion, but because of it, in the name of the lord. It ruins the whole film. It's like watching a movie about orthodox Jews and somehow they're all at Sonny's eating barbecue. It just doesn't happen. Or like watching a movie about the army where are all the rank insignia are wrong. If the Christians had been portrayed more realistically, like committing crimes without simultaneously preaching, or even more realistically, if they weren't portrayed as Christians at all, the movie would have been much better. It's too bad really. It was a good idea for a horror movie but the stupidly unrealistic portrayal of Christians ruined it.

Suicide stalks the population of a religious town, one by one, until the heroine must save herself by dispelling the curse.This moves along at a fair clip, in Final Destination style, and the direction is good. The pursuit by dopplegangers is spooky, with a couple of mild jump scares, although the deaths are tame.Not so sure about the writing, as there are some clunky scenes, stereotypical characters (plus the cousin was there just for plot purposes), and it all wraps up with a ... chase through the woods. There are not just one, but two unconvincing crowd scenes where extras gather around in circles. However, there is a neat twist at the very end.The acting is OK, although the preacher's son seemed to have a giant zit under his makeup. Music lacked passion, but the piano nocturnes were good.Overall it felt overstuffed with elements that the writer struggled to wrap together, and the logic of the story meant the baddies were right all along.The long, scathing review just below is not unfair, but I found this passable entertainment.

Am I seriously the only one who hated Elizabeth Rice? I don't understand why they chose her to play the leading lady. I see people complaining about the script, but I thought the script was great. Elizabeth Rice just doesn't know how to act. The other characters were very believable, but Elizabeth Rice just could not get into character. I didn't believe a word she said. All of her lines were spoken in the same tone, and her only believable expression was when she was crying when she found out that Claire died, and then when she learned that Aidan had to kill himself. I'm sorry, but her eyebrows were just so distracting, too. They're so bushy and she kept moving them, probably to distract us from the fact that she is terrible at faking emotions. I give the movie a 9/10 because luckily, the story, script, cinematography, and other actors made up for Rice's lack of skill. Sadie is hilarious, and I love Margo Harshman in everything she does. I own the movie, and have seen it several times, and I still sob every time I see Aidan kill himself. Even though I am a girl, movies rarely make me cry. I thought Thomas Dekker's acting was amazing right before he was going to kill himself, too. I also did not mind seeing him shirtless at all, even though it was too obvious that the only reason they had him shirtless was so we could have a sexy bod to drool over. Roy was pretty amusing, too, and made me want to start every sentence with "Shit, man". I wonder where they got the idea for Lindsay's strange family, and how Trish got custody of her. What happened to her mother? Doesn't she have any other family? I can overlook this, but they really should have explained this better since it's such a weird situation... I also like how they made the witches the good guys, and the hypocritical-psycho-Christians the bad guys. Even though the witches did put the curse on the town, you can still sympathize with them. I'd want revenge if a bunch of crazy people went and killed my mother for something she didn't do. And once Aidan realized that at least Lindsay wasn't like the others, he regretted what he did, and was willing to take his life to make things right. We all make mistakes and make stupid, impulsive decisions out of anger, but we don't all make up for our mistakes, and most of us wouldn't if it involved killing ourselves. Aidan ended up being a much better person than the Christians in that town, and that is true a lot of the time in real life, as well. I don't have anything against Christians, but I can't stand Christians who are huge hypocrites and horrible people who tell me that my beliefs are wrong and that I'm the bad person. I can relate to Aidan, so I really loved his character. Overall, this is one of my favorite movies, and most people will probably enjoy it if they can look past Rice's acting.

Although this type of film has been done many times before there is always room for good writing, acting, camera work and directing. Hey, if one is going to enjoy a modest budget horror flick one must get past the fact the takes-place-in-a-town-with-weird-residents plus the supernatural-aspects-to-be-taken-for-granted are simply ingrained in the process. This setting and genre must either be accepted and enjoyed or ignored altogether.That said, the acting is FROM WITHIN is exceptional. The teens (and they actually look like teenagers instead of dressed up 30-year-olds) are neither sullen nor over the top but anxious, indecisive, vulnerable; i.e., like real teenagers. Miss Rice in particular delivers her lines in convincing fashion. The two young male leads could easily slide into stereotypes but...well...don't. The adults, e.g., the sheriff and the preacher, aren't overbearing elders. All the adults, in fact, actually interact with the teens, whereas in many movies like this one there is the teen world (Read: real and emotional) and the adult world (Read: static and authoritative).The supernatural aspect, while never believable, is thankfully modest in inception and use. If the final scenes are not edge-of-your-seat they hold your interest as to what's going to happen. Cool "twist" at the very end too. What's a 56-year-old movie snob watching something like this for? Hey, I'm entitled to some fun too. Most things like this are lucky to last 20 minutes on my screen. FROM WITHIN went the full micro-wave popcorn ninety minutes.