Up until the last few minutes, this was a very suspenseful film. Solid actors, a strong plot, and even though characters are required to do incredibly stupid things in order to advance the plot that just comes with the territory. You gotta dance with who brung you, after all.
But a major character disappears without a trace and that plot element is never truly resolved. Yes, we can figure out what probably happened. But closure would be nice.
Then comes the leading lady's final clash with the bad guy, and the whole enterprise goes off the tracks.
MAJOR SPOILERS. YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED.
The triplet plot device is probably the lamest way to resolve the plot of a mystery that I've ever seen. This "paperboy" is played by a 28 year actor and it seems that this character only delivers papers to one street in the town.
There are hints that his character is something other than human, but that's not really developed. And there was a corpse up in that tree that gets a Christian burial and there's talk in the eulogy about his family, but we don't know who they are. What is their part in the plot? Do they not know that their sons are up to no good? Is their mother so stupid that she doesn't know she has two other sons? When the policeman sees the two young men (one with wounds from the confrontation, one unscathed) I fully expected the director to walk from behind the camera and speak into the camera and tell us, "Look, writing movies is hard work. I've torn my hair out trying to come up with an ending and this is the best I can do. If somebody out there has a better idea, come to California and write the sequel." The worst part about the film is seeing such good actors (especially Ray Wise) trapped in a harebrained script. About 90% of the way into the film I'd have given this an 8 or a 9, but inept writing sinks that ship.
As I said, the "demon paperboy" is very effectively played by an actor who was 28 years old at the time of the film's release. Does he terrorize other neighborhoods we don't know about, or go back into a jar with his brothers the rest of the time? By the way, if this story had been set in Texas it would have been about fifteen minutes long. Probably 2/3 of the houses in a typical neighborhood here have firearms so the lad's habit of running and jumping from roof to tree would have seen him brought down like a quail.
But a major character disappears without a trace and that plot element is never truly resolved. Yes, we can figure out what probably happened. But closure would be nice.
Then comes the leading lady's final clash with the bad guy, and the whole enterprise goes off the tracks.
MAJOR SPOILERS. YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED.
The triplet plot device is probably the lamest way to resolve the plot of a mystery that I've ever seen. This "paperboy" is played by a 28 year actor and it seems that this character only delivers papers to one street in the town.
There are hints that his character is something other than human, but that's not really developed. And there was a corpse up in that tree that gets a Christian burial and there's talk in the eulogy about his family, but we don't know who they are. What is their part in the plot? Do they not know that their sons are up to no good? Is their mother so stupid that she doesn't know she has two other sons? When the policeman sees the two young men (one with wounds from the confrontation, one unscathed) I fully expected the director to walk from behind the camera and speak into the camera and tell us, "Look, writing movies is hard work. I've torn my hair out trying to come up with an ending and this is the best I can do. If somebody out there has a better idea, come to California and write the sequel." The worst part about the film is seeing such good actors (especially Ray Wise) trapped in a harebrained script. About 90% of the way into the film I'd have given this an 8 or a 9, but inept writing sinks that ship.
As I said, the "demon paperboy" is very effectively played by an actor who was 28 years old at the time of the film's release. Does he terrorize other neighborhoods we don't know about, or go back into a jar with his brothers the rest of the time? By the way, if this story had been set in Texas it would have been about fifteen minutes long. Probably 2/3 of the houses in a typical neighborhood here have firearms so the lad's habit of running and jumping from roof to tree would have seen him brought down like a quail.