Final Destination Bloodlines

After more than a decade away, the disembodied spectre of Death returns to haunt a new shoal of hapless victims by masquerading as a series of stylishly mounted and entertainingly ridiculous ‘accidents’. In an attempt to freshen its foul breath, this time the filmmakers have gone big AND gone home – the initial premonition of mayhem that kicks everything off takes place decades in the past, therefore our conceptual baddie decides that entire generations of a family need to be wiped out.

As usual, innocent but potentially murderous vehicles and other objects are shot into the frame like a bullet, or given dramatic heft by a sudden judicious close-up. But these jump scares are foreshadowing fingers of fate that dig into your amygdala, rather than dissipate any precious, hard-won tension. Expert editing and spooky sound design imbue these moments with a genuine, if superficial, feeling of dread.

Cleverly ironic dialogue, recontextualised by our expectation of disaster, fuels our superiority complex so that we can guffaw all the harder when these hubristic fools meet their sticky ends at the hands of the ultimate slasher. However, unlike some of the previous films in the series, some effort is made to give these solidly-performed ‘fools’ at least a few inches of emotional depth, so that we might care what happens to them beyond the ingenious horrors around the corner.

Structurally speaking, the writers spin an entire compass of misdirection, tinkering with the formula just enough to introduce a theme of family estrangement as a believable psychological consequence of the general premise, embodied by Gabrielle Rose’s survivalist grandma who’s spent so long evading Death’s icy touch that it’s driven her crazy with paranoia, which she then passes on to Kaitlyn Santa Juana’s otherwise sensible heroine.

The script keeps you guessing how the satisfying set pieces are going to end up connecting together, so that your brain is engaged as much as your heart (with special thanks to a poignant, fan-tweaking cameo from a familiar face), if not quite as much as your funny bone. In these unimaginative times, there’s something refreshing about a film series that sets up unpredictable death scenes while also defying the tyranny of the Hollywood ending; you really do feel that none of these people are going to live happily ever after.

Legend has it that Angus Young, when asked why AC/DC had done twelve albums that all sound the same, replied that actually they’d done thirteen albums and they’re all the bloody same. Well, the Final Destination movies are like that, and in both cases it’s a compliment.

This, like the others, is best appreciated as a comedy for people with a terminally ill sense of humour. The killings can be appreciated for their shock value, their yuck factor, or for how loudly they make you laugh. By that principle, it turns out that some ‘bloody sames’ are better than others, and I humbly apologise to my fellow cinema patrons for the noise.

-Stew Mott-