The Eye 3

It's clear that "The Eye" franchise has run out of steam, ideas, scares, visuals, you name it. It's over.

The film actually begins at a rather swift and surprising pace (with likable people), and it manages to maintain interest for about 25 minutes before slowly deflating in front of your very Eye. It's a ghost-chasing-teen-romp, unlike the first in the series, which was drenched in pathos, hospital sterility, and Mann's physical disability. In fact, this latest movie references the first Eye quite frequently, especially the haunted elevator scene and the bit with the young boy-ghost trying to find his report card in the apartment stairwell. But this film recreates these once-fraught scenes in a self-conscious giggling way. Unfortunately the effect was to make me want to watch the original outing one more time because it really is such a fine, grave, and startling film.

Alas, this third in the series is none of the above.

Oh, and it's not funny either.

I suppose the Pangs wanted to get away from the dread-filled atmosphere of the first two features, and so they rely on some ham-fisted joking and some outright slapstick between the scares. The real low moment came when the unavoidable fart joke appeared--farting as a means to ward off evil spirits. Hmmmm. I knew at that very moment the franchise had squeaked out its last gassssssp. Goodbye Eye.