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| Rating: |
   
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| Run Time: |
90 min |
| MPAA Rating: |
R |
| Released: |
2003 |
| Directors: |
David R. Ellis
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| Genre/Type: |
Horror
Slasher Film
Teen Movie
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| Producers: |
Craig Perry
Warren Zide
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Plot Synopsis by Mark Deming
Death lurks, and two teenage girls try to figure out where he's heading, in this sequel to the unexpected teen horror hit
Final Destination. As Clear Rivers (
Ali Larter), the only surviving passenger of the ill-fated Flight 180, waits in a mental institution, certain Death will claim her, Kim (
A.J. Cook), who has begun to display precognitive powers, is driving along the highway when she sees a terrible accident in which several cars crash into a logging truck. Moments later, the horrible vision is gone, but Kim is certain she saw an accident that was supposed to happen but didn't...and now Death will track down the souls he meant to take that day who slipped through his fingers. A police officer, Thomas Burke (
Michael Landes), believes there's a germ of truth in Kim's story, and teams her up with Clear in hopes that together they can help prevent Death from snuffing out any more of the people involves in the accident that wasn't. Tony Todd also returns from the first film as Mr. Bludworth.
With mixed reviews and a domestic gross just north of 50 million dollars,
Final Destination was an unlikely candidate to spawn a sequel, despite its slick (and wickedly morbid) execution of a smart concept. But Final Destination 2 justifies all risks taken to give it a theatrical release, as a mostly new cast and crew reproduce the original formula in a manner that may actually be more self-assured and satisfying. It's certainly funnier, though most of the laughter comes in the form of head-shaking howls at the gruesome and gory abruptness of the deaths. J. Mackye Gruber's script understands how to set up these punchlines through seat-squirming red herrings -- the audience can't bear to watch a dentist aim his hypodermic needle at an impending victim's gums -- so even when viewers telegraph the twists that are meant to defy their expectations, it's still cathartic. The adroit staging of these scenes, veritable montages of fatal coincidence, makes it easier to forgive director David R. Ellis for overusing them to the point of redundancy. The film even constructs a somewhat intelligible plan to flout Death's design that links to the first film, though viewers should be prepared to make concessions in the logic department. Final Destination 2 reiterates the best strength of its surprisingly fertile franchise: a liberating format that doesn't rely on serial killers pouncing from the shadows, instead indulging in a genuinely inventive and comic view of predestined doom.