Ritual

Ritual (2002)

‘80s sweetheart Jennifer Grey plays a disgraced doctor named Alice who has her licensed suspended for using an experimental medicine to try and save a patient. The only job she can get is working for a wealthy family on an isolated Jamaican plantation. Almost from the moment she arrives strange things begin happening and when she finally meets her patient she is shocked to find out that he thinks that he is a zombie. When bodies start to turn up on the island and Alice finds out that her predecessor died she thinks about leaving. But the same stubbornness that caused her to use the drug makes her stick around to try and help those that think they have been cursed. Eventually she unravels what is going on and who the “big” man is behind it all.

I wasn’t looking forward to this movie at all. To begin with this was supposed to be the 3rd installment of the Tales from the Crypt movie series. After the 1st couple of entries in the series flopped this was released as a stand-alone movie. Though the Crypt Keeper does show up in the beginning to introduce the story! And then I found out that this was supposed to be a remake of the classic Val Lewton produced I Walked with a Zombie. So a remake as part of a failed franchise. That is not a formula for a successful movie at all.

But I got it for review so I forced myself to watch it. And I’ll be damned if it isn’t a pretty good movie. This isn’t really so much a horror movie as it is a mystery with some supernatural elements to it. For most of the movie it is just Alice trying to figure out what the heck is happening on the plantation and how the past ties in to it. And while it does have some of the elements of I Walked with a Zombie (the illness in the family, voodoo, twist ending involving the identity of the head of the voodoo “cult”) it is it’s own movie. I give the movie some props for trying to tell a different story and again I found it enjoyable. Ritual pulls off the neat trick of giving you just enough information to keep things interesting all while making the twists work with the story and feel natural. I do love a good mystery.

I was surprised at the lack of gore. There are some murders and we do see a bit of blood, but nothing is graphic or shown on the screen. The only real exception to this is the 1st death that we see which involves someone getting rather hot under the collar… Oddly enough, considering the other Tales movies, Ritual goes for atmosphere rather then gore. The movie does have some good camera work and is edited in such a way that it is tense and tosses a few jump scares at us. In this way it is more reminiscent of Lewton’s I Walked with a Zombie.

I can see Ritual maybe not appealing to everyone. If you are sitting down for some gore and a few laughs then this isn’t the flick for you. On the other hand if you enjoy some old school horror then you might dig Ritual as much as I did. With that in mind I do recommend it. If this had been the 1st Tales from the Crypt movie we probably would still be watching them in the theater. It is available from Echo Bridge Home Entertainment click here for more details.

3 out of 4

reviewed by John Shatzer