Before I went to see Flatliners, I did some research. This is actually a remake of the original 1990 movie with the same name. There had been rumors that it was a sequel but I wasn’t sure what to expect because I never saw the original, directed by Joel Schumacher. This version was directed by Niels Arden Oplev who had more experience directing Danish films and children’s films. I wasn’t expecting much because remakes aren’t usually as good as the originals. Consider the challenges faced by those who wanted to revisit Jason, Michael Myers, and Nightmare on Elm Street.

The movie is about five medical students who embark on a daring and dangerous experience to see how the afterlife. They start experimenting with being dead for five seconds, but they get more curious about the mystery of what lies ahead of them.

I was clued to my seat in the beginning. The theory was interesting and I wanted to know more about how it worked and why they were doing it. As the movie went on, though, it started to get cheesy with stupid jump scares just for the sake of shocking the audience. I mean, I get scared easily and they did continue to scare me, but it was more intentional.

There were some good parts and the casting was good. Characters like Courtney (played by Ellen Page) was obsessed with the experience, but the rest of the characters just wanted to try. None of them seemed to learn from their mistakes. When you watch it’s a bit confusing and hard to tell if they’re being haunted by ghost, plagued by a demon, or simply experiencing hallucinations.

Overall the movie wasn’t that good. They tried to make it interesting and the design was amazing, but it flopped in a million ways. This movie did have promise, judging from the trailers, but I think it is you will forget about its impact in t-minus two seconds.