See No Evil 2

At the end of the first See No Evil I asked how they'd bring Jacob Goodnight (Kane) back after showing his heart punctured. As best I can tell See No Evil 2 doesn't attempt to answer that...or explain why everyone suddenly seems to know his name and history. The movie begins immediately after the end of the previous film, but all the characters talk as if they screened the previous film.

I love the Soska Sisters. They're fun, charismatic, sexy, and talented. That said, however, I sometimes want to climb up on my high horse and wish for another American Mary in-between their B-movies. As filmmakers they often come off as slacker geniuses. In terms of direction See No Evil 2 is far better done than it's predecessor. It's shot well, and it's score is far more better than the previous film, but I felt like the characters were all far less memorable.

Ironically, the attempts to make the characters unlikable in the last film made them a lot more interesting. It's unbelievable that they couldn't come up with more meat when they cast both Danielle Harris and Katherine Isabelle. Tamara (Isabelle) is probably the only character that stuck out at all, and her defining trait is that she's a sex maniac obsessed with corpses. As best I can tell Goodnight is jolted back to life by his powerful need to kill her and her boyfriend (Lee Majdoub) when they have sex in front of his dead body.

While the flashbacks aren't quite as egregious as they were in the first movie, we still get a number of them reused to remind us that Goodnight's mother tortured him into being a killer. This time around, however, Goodnight is given more dialogue, and he really becomes something of a weakness to the film. Kane can be intimidating, but he's too hammy to carry emotional scenes well.

The ultimate condemnation of this film, though, is that I really don't feel like talking about it. I saw the first film only to see the set-up for this movie, but was impressed by what was effectively a fun over-the-top splatter film. This movie never really goes over-the-top, and too much of it feels recycled from the previous entry, with easily the best kill being a repeat of the chain kill from the first movie. Twisted Twins, I love you, but you can do better.