The First Three Final Destination Films

FINAL DESTINATION

A film from the year 2000 in which death chases seven individuals who got off an airplane minutes before it exploded, Final Destination has a couple of clever death scenes and a visually-interesting finale (followed by a brief epilogue in Paris) but has little else going for it.  The story follows Alex, a high school student about to embark on a class trip to France.  After he boards the plane, Alex has a vision of the vehicle exploding shortly into its flight.  Alex freaks and gets off the plane.  One of his classmates (a girl named Clear Rivers) follows his lead.  Four other students and a teacher exit the plane and don’t re-board it only to see it explode in the air shortly after takeoff.  The FBI takes an interest in Alex’s tale of having a vision of the plane blowing up and investigates him.  Death, it turns out, does not like to be cheated, and soon one of Alex’s classmates (a fellow named Tod) dies in his bathroom through a most unfortunate accident that causes him to be strangled by cords in the shower stall.  Another survivor of the plane debacle gets run over by a bus.  Alex concludes that death has come back for those who escaped and will pick them off in the order they would have died on the plane.  The teacher bites the dust, and the remaining teens nearly get run over by a train.  One of them is decapitated shortly thereafter when a metal shard gets caught in a blast of wind.  Alex thinks he’s figured out a way to cheat death for good, but will his plan succeed?

The subplot about the FBI investigation of Alex goes nowhere and seems to exist just to pad out the movie’s running time.  Also, the story structure feels off with the plane exploding a full 18 minutes in.  I’d rather have seen the setup occur a lot faster, with the airplane disaster happening around ten minutes in and the first death of a survivor at the eighteen-minute mark instead.  Final Destination is really just a string of set-pieces designed to be entertaining and original death scenes.  If that’s enough for you, check it out.

FINAL DESTINATION 2

The first sequel in this franchise features deaths that are generally more over-the-top and spectacular than those in part one, though the plot doesn’t make any more sense this time around.  A young woman named Kim has a premonition of a major highway accident (the best set-piece in the picture) and (by blocking the on-ramp) saves the lives of several motorists including a cop.  After one of the survivors dies in a freak accident, Kim begins to seriously compare the situation of the saved motorists to that of the survivors of Flight 180 from the first film.  She seeks out Clear Rivers (who voluntarily lives in a padded sanitarium room) for advice.  Clear is inspired to help Kim and the others attempt to defeat death.  A couple more people die, and then Kim apparently finds a loophole by drowning herself and being revived by a doctor.

The writers went to great lengths to tie this narrative to the first film (going so far as to make Clear Rivers a major active character and establishing that all of the survivors this time around had some sort of connection to those from the original story).  This struck me as unnecessary.  Wouldn’t it be enough just to keep the formula of disaster survivors being stalked by death in the order they were supposed to perish?  Another returning character from the first film (a mortician) spouts some nonsense about how only new life can interrupt death’s design.  Like the first Final Destination, this project is essentially a set of clever death scenes strung together by a plot that doesn’t necessarily hold up under scrutiny.

FINAL DESTINATION 3

In the third installment, a high school senior named Wendy has a premonition that saves several roller coaster riders from a fatal accident.  As in the first two films, death stalks the survivors in the order they were supposed to die.  One fellow does some web research and learns about Flight 180 from the first movie.  From that point on, Wendy attempts to figure out a way to cheat the grim reaper.  In an epilogue, Wendy has another premonition (this time while riding a subway), and the implication seems to be that she will not survive.

Again, this project is a series of set pieces in which assorted teens die in unique ways (two are trapped in tanning booths and burn to death, one gets hit in the head repeatedly by a nail gun, etc).  Again, the plot is pretty thin, and the first Final Destination is referenced gratuitously.  If you just want to spend an hour and a half watching a few clever deaths, this film might sate you.  I’d advise steering clear of the franchise as a whole.