Sam, his ex-girlfriend Molly, and his work colleagues are traveling on a bus to a convention organized by their company, Presage. While crossing a bridge, Sam has a vision in which he is told of the catastrophic collapse of the structure that will cause their deaths and those of hundreds of other people. Panicked, Sam gets off the bus stopped in traffic and warns the other passengers of the possible danger, dragging Molly with him. Some of them listen to him and follow him, and as predicted, the bridge collapses causing a myriad of victims. But the survivors of the accident begin to die in mysterious circumstances in the order in which they exited in Sam's vision: Death has returned to settle the score!
Since 2000, Death has returned punctually every three years to reclaim those who, by a strange twist of fate, managed to escape its watchful and inexorable scythe. After the great success of “The Final Destination 3D,” the fourth installment and the first in stereoscopy, the three-year timeline between films is broken, and a fifth chapter is immediately put into production, of course also in 3D. Result? “Final Destination 5” is surprisingly one of the best chapters in a saga that, while always quite entertaining, was beginning to show concerning weakness in the last two installments.
Let's make it clear that after the disappointing “The Final Destination 3D,” in which the narrative was reduced to almost nothing in favor of the 3D gimmick alone, not much was expected, also aware of the almost instant movie status that the fifth installment had assumed. Instead, New Line has learned from its mistakes and produced a product that, in addition to being fast, funny, and grotesquely splatter, also adds elements to the usual trite and retreaded narrative mechanics.
The story is always the same: the usual people who escaped a collective disaster following a premonition from one of them, who one by one exit the scene in the most improbable ways possible, claimed by Death itself. Practically the nightmare of every screenwriter, called to make an interesting story out of a thin, schematic, and already told four times in the last 10 years without the possibility of straying too far from the pre-set tracks. Eric Heisserer, who had already been tasked with updating “Nightmare” with the recent remake and “The Thing” with the upcoming prequel, performs miracles and, while telling the same story for the fifth time, adds new elements, creates a pleasant connection with the first film, and even manages to give the characters a bit of depth. This time, there is a way to escape Death, and it is not the bypass postulated in the first and third films, but a definitive salvation (at least until the next, hopefully distant, departure). The price to pay is high, but a way to outwit Death exists, and this manages to give the story that “quid” that makes it more original and engaging than the previous ones, since this time the scheme can be modified and the countdown of deaths is not so predictable. The way the film manages to place itself within the saga as a precise piece of a mosaic is another point in its favor that gives coherence to an overall narrative that still has more dark spots.
The characters of this “Final Destination 5” are not the usual teenagers who have populated this saga (especially in the first and third films), but rather a heterogeneous group of people, work colleagues, who seem to reflect in their composition the attempt already experimented with in “Final Destination 2,” to date the most successful chapter of the saga. The characters and personalities are basic and never go into depth, but with a few elements, they still manage to characterize most of them in a rather convincing way, at least enough to make the characters distinguishable and to empathize with some of them. Furthermore, just as it happened with the second film, elements of grotesque humor are inserted, reaching their peak in the character of Isaac and especially in his “moment” at the massage center.
Of course, the focus is heavily on the strange and original deaths that can surprise and give way to blood and guts to spread as much as possible. In this regard, it is especially the accident of the first victim, the gymnast, that remains well impressed in the viewer's mind, managing to secure one of the top spots in an ideal ranking of the best deaths in the saga. The initial accident on a suspension bridge also surprises positively. Surely, this is the most spectacular of the entire saga and rivals the chain collision on the highway from the second film as the best in absolute terms. And here, some credit must also be given to Steven Quale, a nearly debuting director after a long apprenticeship as James Cameron's assistant, who handles both the spectacle of the action scenes and the construction of suspense excellently.
The experience as Cameron's assistant in “Avatar” and the direction of the documentary “Aliens of the Deep” will surely have been worth it for the management of the native 3D, which in this “Final Destination 5” works very well. As happened in the previous chapter, here too the 3D is used not only for the boring depth effect that more and more often gives the impression of poorly investing the price difference compared to the 2D movie ticket. But the 3D does its job especially for the dear old amusement park rides in which objects of all kinds (including organic fluids and tripe of all kinds) rain down on the viewer, thus restoring genuineness to stereoscopy for what it was originally created for.
In the cast of unknowns – as per the rule – stand out the semi-familiar faces of Nicholas D’Agosto, whom some may remember among the protagonists of the second season of “Heroes,” and Emma Bell, already a protagonist of “Frozen” and among the characters of the first season of “The Walking Dead.” Furthermore, Tony Todd also returns to wear for the third time the mephistophelian role of the coroner who “knows something about Death's plans,” this time with a slightly more substantial role for his character.
In short, “Final Destination 5” surprisingly works and allows the viewer to enjoy 90 minutes of sure entertainment. Absolutely recommended to fans of the saga.
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