Solstice

We have here another thriller in which a bunch of young people head out into the middle of nowhere and find themselves stuck in a "scary" situation. What I will say in favour of this movie is that at least it avoided the cliché of having some type of cannibalistic mass murderer out to get them (a cliché that was actually mentioned by one of the characters when they met up with the creepy old guy from the other side of the lake.) In this case, we have young Megan, still tormented by the suicide of her twin sister six months before, heading off with a bunch of her friends on their annual trip to celebrate the summer solstice in the Bayou of Louisiana. Why they do this wasn't entirely clear to me, except that Megan's mom is some sort of anthropologist or something who specializes in culture and so apparently they celebrate every holiday known to humanity (which is a pretty nice gig if you can get it!) Once they're in the Bayou, Megan starts to have visions which she thinks are of her sister, and she discovers in a magazine (quite conveniently) that the summer solstice is the perfect time to contact the dead. She also conveniently runs into a local hunk of a grocery store clerk who happens to know how to contact the dead because his grandmother was involved in voodoo. I'm not kidding.

Now, as truly silly as that all seems, I have to say that, while it's full of mostly forgettable (although not bad) performances, this movie isn't terrible. There's a pretty decent buildup of the intrigue and suspense until the final secret which finally connects both Megan's visions and the creepy old guy is revealed, but you do have to get through a lot of pretty cliché type situations to get there. As a timewaster this isn't bad, but if you want a really good thriller, this is not going to satisfy at all. 5/10