"Do You Wanna Know a Secret?" is a lame and fairly unexciting slasher.
**SPOILERS**
A year after a college massacre, students Hank Ford, (Joseph Lawrence) his girlfriend Beth Morgan, (Dorie Barton) and their friends Tina Webster, (Leonora Scelfo) Nellie Lopez, (Elsie Escobar) Oz Washington, (Tom Jay Jones) and Brad Adams, (Chad Allen) arrive in Florida for Spring Break. Renting a house for the time, they start drinking and having a good time together until past incidents are exposed. As they prepare to go to a local rave, their emotions still get the best of them. As people around them start to die one-by-one, tensions mount as they believe each other did it, as they all have secrets to hide from each other. When they continue to meet gruesome deaths, they piece together the clues and solve the killer's identity before they kill again.
The Good News: There isn't a whole lot here that actually works. The biggest issue is that the film does manage to sell the creepy house they're staying in a place of potentially suspenseful. There's lots of long hallways, creepy furniture and statues that adorn the walls and large glass windows that allow in lots of light into the rooms. It manages to stay a threat mainly due to it's appearance once it's been discovered that the friends are starting to get knocked off. The tension at not knowing who or where the killer is. That gives it some pretty nice suspense in the middle of the film, due to it's location. The main bloodshed acts in the house are pretty good, as there's several deaths all pretty close to each other. The scene where they're all in the rave is pretty entertaining in a realistic manner, as it's exactly the kind of behavior to be expected in that kind of environment from those involved. All these, though, are the film's main points.
The Bad News: This here is a really lackluster slasher with some major flaws. One of the main ones is a really, really staggered pace. There's absolutely nothing going on in here for about forty minutes in this, then there's about a five minute phase where everyone gets killed off, then nothing until the very end. The fact that the ending is completely dragged out far beyond what it should've been is another big error, making things take longer than it could've been done had it in a much shorter fashion. This really negates much of the ending's impact, which wasn't that much to begin with as it takes forever to spill to the characters what the audience had known since the film started. That's another problem, as the film is really easy to predict and no real surprises come from it. Plot turns are fairly simple to guess and don't have any real shock when they come as they were sign-posted early on and don't really mean much. The killer in this is the biggest one, as the mask chosen devalues the fear of this intensely. It's way too comical and non-frightening to make it serious they're a threat. Not harming matters is the fact that the deaths are a severe disappointment. There's only about two or three deaths actually done on-screen while the rest are all killed off-screen, and the ones on-screen are simply slit throats while the ones that would've appeared to be more adventurous are all off-screen. That's one of the most maddening things about it, and really helps to make this a really below par-entry.
The Final Verdict: A few small areas of success and a lot of major problems doom this potentially entertaining but ultimately unsuccessful attempt. Had it followed through more on the slasher motives, this would be watchable, but as it is, this is really only recommended for the most die-hard slasher completists or those looking for a solid laugh-fest with friends.
Rated R: Graphic Language, Graphic Violence and some drug use
**SPOILERS**
A year after a college massacre, students Hank Ford, (Joseph Lawrence) his girlfriend Beth Morgan, (Dorie Barton) and their friends Tina Webster, (Leonora Scelfo) Nellie Lopez, (Elsie Escobar) Oz Washington, (Tom Jay Jones) and Brad Adams, (Chad Allen) arrive in Florida for Spring Break. Renting a house for the time, they start drinking and having a good time together until past incidents are exposed. As they prepare to go to a local rave, their emotions still get the best of them. As people around them start to die one-by-one, tensions mount as they believe each other did it, as they all have secrets to hide from each other. When they continue to meet gruesome deaths, they piece together the clues and solve the killer's identity before they kill again.
The Good News: There isn't a whole lot here that actually works. The biggest issue is that the film does manage to sell the creepy house they're staying in a place of potentially suspenseful. There's lots of long hallways, creepy furniture and statues that adorn the walls and large glass windows that allow in lots of light into the rooms. It manages to stay a threat mainly due to it's appearance once it's been discovered that the friends are starting to get knocked off. The tension at not knowing who or where the killer is. That gives it some pretty nice suspense in the middle of the film, due to it's location. The main bloodshed acts in the house are pretty good, as there's several deaths all pretty close to each other. The scene where they're all in the rave is pretty entertaining in a realistic manner, as it's exactly the kind of behavior to be expected in that kind of environment from those involved. All these, though, are the film's main points.
The Bad News: This here is a really lackluster slasher with some major flaws. One of the main ones is a really, really staggered pace. There's absolutely nothing going on in here for about forty minutes in this, then there's about a five minute phase where everyone gets killed off, then nothing until the very end. The fact that the ending is completely dragged out far beyond what it should've been is another big error, making things take longer than it could've been done had it in a much shorter fashion. This really negates much of the ending's impact, which wasn't that much to begin with as it takes forever to spill to the characters what the audience had known since the film started. That's another problem, as the film is really easy to predict and no real surprises come from it. Plot turns are fairly simple to guess and don't have any real shock when they come as they were sign-posted early on and don't really mean much. The killer in this is the biggest one, as the mask chosen devalues the fear of this intensely. It's way too comical and non-frightening to make it serious they're a threat. Not harming matters is the fact that the deaths are a severe disappointment. There's only about two or three deaths actually done on-screen while the rest are all killed off-screen, and the ones on-screen are simply slit throats while the ones that would've appeared to be more adventurous are all off-screen. That's one of the most maddening things about it, and really helps to make this a really below par-entry.
The Final Verdict: A few small areas of success and a lot of major problems doom this potentially entertaining but ultimately unsuccessful attempt. Had it followed through more on the slasher motives, this would be watchable, but as it is, this is really only recommended for the most die-hard slasher completists or those looking for a solid laugh-fest with friends.
Rated R: Graphic Language, Graphic Violence and some drug use