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Stay Alive
- Review Date: September 14, 2006
- PG-13
- Genre: Horror
- 2006
Common Sense Media says
Ridiculous slasher flick. Teens, go elsewhere.
Parents say
QUALITY
Kids say
QUALITY
What parents need to know
Parents need to know that film includes frequent references to killing and images of murder. Though most of the violent acts (stabbing, shooting, neck-slicing) are intimated rather than graphic, the bloody effects are very visible. The video game at the film's center is based on a real-life legend (a 17th-century Hungarian Countess who supposedly killed hundreds of children), and her young, white-gowned victim-ghosts appear as bloody, ravaged and broken (digitized) forms. After first murders (including a hanging), characters attend a funeral. One character lies about her family background (pretending to be of a higher social class). One early sex scene features two naked young people, one in a pig mask; the primary couple kisses near the end (typically, just when you think they should be running away!). Two characters smoke cigarettes; one smokes marijuana via a bong.
What's the story?
When a nerdishly enthusiastic player (Milo Ventimiglia) tries the unreleased video game "Stay Alive," he and two friends end up viciously murdered, a new crew gets hold of the game, including earnest Hutch (Jon Foster), dorky Phineus (Jimmi Simpson) and tech-head Swink (Frankie Muniz). The requisite girls are Phin's gothy sister October (Sophia Bush) and last minute tagalong Abigail (Samaire Armstrong). When Phin insists that they should all game in honor of their fallen gamer friend, the game provides them with muscular avatars, guns and crossbows, then leads them to a terrible place featuring a dungeon, torture, and mayhem, where they start dying in real life the ways they die in the game.
Is it any good?
Ridiculous and then some, STAY ALIVE offers the usual slasher movie set-up: young people making one wrong decision after another. Here they're up against a video game character, the "Blood Countess" (Maria Kalinina), complete with red gown and pasty face. She's based on a real life Hungarian serial killer, transferred to New Orleans (where some of the film was shot, just before Hurricane Katrina hit last year), and is accompanied by ghosts of her victims, little girls in white dresses and J-horror-styled stringy hair.
The painfully necessary romance between Hutch and Abigail slows down the action somewhat, especially as she must send him forth to fight the Countess on his own, while she stays behind in a barred room and counts off rose petals to the hackneyed tune of "He loves me, he loves me not." This just before Swink comes back from the apparent dead, to restore the endangered pretty couple. Why, we'll never know.
Explore, discuss, enjoy
Families can talk about the relationships between friends and, in one case, sister and brother. How do these bonds lead them to investigate the murders and then get in trouble? How can video games or other media affect your sense of reality and responsibility, or your social life?
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Adult
April 9, 2008
AGE
Cute Horror Flick
To answer the above review, it got a PG 13 because there was very little actual violence in the movie and even the virtual violence was pretty tame. This is significantly less gruesome than most action-adventure movies and *way* less gory than most of the video games it emulated. There were depictions of violent death but for the most part the camera just flashed to and away from it, preventing viewers from seeing anything but a bunch of red.
When my friends and I saw it, the theater was packed with kids in the 10-15 range and they spent most of the movie screaming and laughing and generally seeming to have fun.
The premise is clever and it's fairly well executed. With things like Hostel and Saw II and The Hills Have Eyes out on the market, this is pretty much the only option for kids who want to see a horror flick. Luckily for them, it's not half bad.
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Teen, 13 years old
April 9, 2008
AGE
Cool.
I liked this movie. I mean the first scene is a 3-second flash of a screaming zombie! How more PG-13 could you get? This shouldn't've been rated PG-13; it had a lot of action. I liked this movie though, they all die in the most creative ways. I mean, isn't it awesome to go flipping off a balcony, landing on a chandelier, breaking your neck, and hang on the chandelier like you're on a noose? Yeah, sounds real PG-13 to me. But anyways, I liked it.
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Kid, 12 years old
April 9, 2008
AGE
great horror flick
this is one of the best horror movies ive ever seen csm should have given this a pause
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Teen, 15 years old
April 9, 2008
AGE
Interesting plot!
This movie was pretty interesting. It was a different pg-13 horror flick and it gave you some good scares and jumping out of your seat moments. In my opinion this might have been a little bit to much for a pg-13 film(with the way the characters were killed off,)but it kept you awake and wondering what would happen next. I really liked the backround(settings)of where the movie took place.(the creepy house,the torture chamber,and the scary graveyard.)
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Teen, 14 years old
April 9, 2008
AGE
Not Scary at All
Pathetically stupid, with a somewhat unique plot, and unscary jump scenes, its easier to consider a comedy than a horror film. Worth it on a boring night, but dont expect anything great.
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Adult
April 9, 2008
AGE
not horrible, not great
It's an average horror movie. The language is much too bad for children to watch it, however.
As for scary images, it's simply not that scary. I jumped maybe once the entire time.
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Teen, 16 years old
April 9, 2008
AGE
It was good
I have the PG-13 version on DVD because I hadn't seen it in the movies and i bought it the first day it came out, so i didnt know if the directors cut had the orginal version so i just got the Pg-13 one and now i regret it. I really want the unrated because the pg-13 version is pretty tame. The only violence and gore for it is mostly in the game and the death scenes they flash away
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Kid, 12 years old
April 9, 2008
AGE
an awesome movie.......
Stay Alive is an awesome movie-in my and my friends oppinion anyway. if u r thinkin of watchin the Directors Cut version of this moviehere r some things to consider.Sure its and awesome movie but it uses the swears f--k, b--ch, ba---rd, a--, motherf---er, D**n, d-ck and s--t,alot of times. there is also one scene around the beginning where there r 2 people havein sex, and u can c the dude's butt.(lol).later u can also briefly c boobs. So personally, i think it should b 'R'.theres my opinion, and it is A MUST C MOVIE!(sorry for bad spelling and grammer im used 2 MSN, oops, i did it again lol.)
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Teen, 13 years old
December 8, 2010
AGE
Loved Loomis. Loved the movie. Hate the Blood.
I saw the movie a couple years ago, and i liked it. I wasnt paying too much attention, though. I was reading a book through the movie.
but just recently, a week or two ago, i watched this movie with my younger sister (one year difference) and actually took notice of all of the violence. This still continues to be my fave horror movie, but i was a little upset over the amount of blood.
Otherwise, Loomis, (Milo Ventimiglia) was in my perspective, the best character. I am a huge heroes fan, so of course ill love that character, so yeah.
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| Studio: | Touchstone Pictures |
| Director: | William Brent Bell |
| Cast: | Frankie Muniz, Milo Ventimiglia, Samaire Armstrong |
| Genre: | Horror |
| Run time: | 85 minutes |
| Theatrical release date: | March 24, 2006 |
| DVD release date: | September 19, 2006 |
| MPAA rating: | PG-13 |
| MPAA explanation: | violence, disturbing images, language, and brief sexual and drug content. |
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