While driving in a side road following a truck with her boyfriend Rob (Tad Hilgenbrink), there is a strange accident and Shelby (Laura Breckenridge) is abducted by a deranged driver. Tabitha (Katheryn Winnick) is kidnapped from her uncle's house by a man dressed of clown. Lisa (Jessica Lucas) is caught in an old pension by a twisted man. The three women are former school friends from Briar Hills and sooner they find themselves in an underground prison; further, they discover that the abductor is a former school mate that had psychological problems and is seeking revenge against them.
The plot of "Amusement" is so unreasonable (actually absurd) that irritates. The first segment (Shelby) is dumb with unexplained attitudes that do not make sense. For example, who is the girl in the truck; why she writes a note asking for help and jumps from the truck immediately after? Who would chase a truck with a dangerous kidnapper in the middle of nowhere leaving the girlfriend and a wounded girl behind on the secondary road? Why the truck driver runs over Rob? Why did he stop in a creepy house if he was close to the gas station? Tabitha's segment is the best and slightly inspired in the 1979 "When a Stranger Calls", but uses the bad clichés with the woman running from a backyard to a closed space and finding the body of the babysitter. Lisa's segment is also terrible, and who would sneak in a frightening place after the disappearance of her best friend Cat and her boyfriend Dan inside the house? The annoying and insane criminal is not developed and the viewer never knows how he got the isolated underground facility and why the psychiatrist of Briar Hills would visit a patient in a visibly abandoned spot. Last but not the least, the re-creation of the art boxes by the maniac is simply ridiculous. The good points of this flick are the cinematography and the acting, but that is not enough to save the story. My vote is four.
Title (Brazil): "Diversão Macabra" ("Macabre Diversion")
The plot of "Amusement" is so unreasonable (actually absurd) that irritates. The first segment (Shelby) is dumb with unexplained attitudes that do not make sense. For example, who is the girl in the truck; why she writes a note asking for help and jumps from the truck immediately after? Who would chase a truck with a dangerous kidnapper in the middle of nowhere leaving the girlfriend and a wounded girl behind on the secondary road? Why the truck driver runs over Rob? Why did he stop in a creepy house if he was close to the gas station? Tabitha's segment is the best and slightly inspired in the 1979 "When a Stranger Calls", but uses the bad clichés with the woman running from a backyard to a closed space and finding the body of the babysitter. Lisa's segment is also terrible, and who would sneak in a frightening place after the disappearance of her best friend Cat and her boyfriend Dan inside the house? The annoying and insane criminal is not developed and the viewer never knows how he got the isolated underground facility and why the psychiatrist of Briar Hills would visit a patient in a visibly abandoned spot. Last but not the least, the re-creation of the art boxes by the maniac is simply ridiculous. The good points of this flick are the cinematography and the acting, but that is not enough to save the story. My vote is four.
Title (Brazil): "Diversão Macabra" ("Macabre Diversion")