The Messengers is an all-too-predictable scare flick that relies primarily on loud noises and sudden gruesome images for fright value.
The story: a family moves to a deserted sunflower farm in North Dakota hoping to make a fresh start and a sufficient living. As soon as they arrive, it is evident that something's not quite right with the homestead. Practically everything that traditionally suggests that a haunting plagues their new house - doors that open and close by themselves, strange noises and screams, and flickering lights - and yet, they refuse to move.
Parents Dylan McDermott (The Practice) and Penelope Ann Miller (Scent of a Woman) are painfully boring in their portrayals, and John Corbett, going the grunge route as an itinerant farmer, is wasted in a minor role. Twins Evan and Theodore Turner both play the adorable toddler Ben, who first sees the ghosts, and Kristen Stewart (Panic Room) gives a decent performance as the daughter tormented by the paranormal.
Clich‚s are abundant, including sequences obviously ripped off from The Birds and ghostly figures that are carbon copies of the corpse-like girl seen in The Ring. All in all, the movie is not that scary, but the abrupt appearances of the ghosts might cause some viewers to jump out of their seats a few times. In a last ditch effort to inject some originality into The Messengers, the writers crafted a surprise ending, but the twist doesn't come close to saving such a shoddy work.
At the Philadelphia screening of the film, one sarcastic critic gave a round of applause at the credits - and the rest of theater joined in with a deafening round of boos. Learn from them, and treat The Messengers like a really nasty ghost: stay away.
