As much as I’m here to guide your inquiring minds through the world of amazing and often little-known films, I’m also here to help you avoid wasting time on the bombs as well! For thrillers and horrors, it’s usually pretty easy when to tell you’re watching a low-budget “hack and slash” and 98% of the time those are the disasters you need to avoid. Yes, I’m sure the people who made it are very impressed with the FILM 101 final project they’ve slapped together, but as a discerning viewer, I’m looking for something with quality which I’m sorry but for the most part includes some money and names backing it. “Die” is a very recent Canadian release that DOES have a great look and more than a couple names to it (well, if you’re an underground canuck TV and movie buff you’d recognize the names, so I won’t even try to throw any at ya ha). Unfortunately, this $$ and cast can’t save a tragic plot that comes up snake eyes (Patrick, that was for you ;)

Keeping it brief: “Die” is a play on words that combines the verb and noun form of the word as rolling a die becomes the deciding factor about how much torture the protagonists will have to endure. A “1″ roll is the least amount of damage while “6″ is the most and it’s a game of chance that says if you live or die in this film. A simple premise, the movie tries to give it depth by tracking the police in their search for the tortured captives while we discover more and more about the flawed main characters who are rolling the die to save their lives.

The film takes places in a hypothetical Gotham city which recalls past gems like “Dark City” and of course “Batman” but there’s just something lacking in “Die’s” world. There’s too many moments in this one where you’ll find yourself struggling to believe anyone would ACTUALLY react in the manner the characters do and rolling your eyes at the unlikely adeptness of the antagonist and his annoying omnipotence. Taking page from past great torture/captive films like “Cube” and “Saw”, this one fails at its attempt to pit the ‘napped characters against each other and instead falls apart by the denouement as the viewer pretty easily guesses how it’ll all turn out.

Up to you rather you’d like to give this one a go, but I’m telling you: those with a brain will be turning it off by the quarter mark… I of course only watched it through and through to rate it for ya haha ;)

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