You know how some movies can be so bad that they're secretly kind of good? Truth or Dare might be one of those movies.
As far as being legitimately good, it's not. It's terrible. It's littered with nonsensical reactions, silly dialogue, and unintentionally hilarious moments. Maybe those weird smiles that every character makes at one point are scary to others, but I found them funny every time.
The movie is pretty straightforward, but I'll give a brief explanation anyway. A group of friends goes to Mexico on spring break. While there, a stranger invites them to play truth or dare in a creepy abandoned church. It turns out that the game is possessed by a demon who follows them and forces them to continue playing the game until every player is dead. Fail a dare, you die. Tell a lie, you die. Refuse to play, you die.
The game and movie are essentially Jumanji crossed with Final Destination. It's PG-13, so it's not nearly as graphic as Final Destination, which I didn't mind.
It all sounds simple enough. But, the filmmakers still changed the rules throughout the movie and also radically changed what we knew about the characters. Maybe these changes were supposed to indicate that the game reveals our true selves and all the previous information was false. But that doesn't totally work because even characters who know nothing about the game change drastically from one scene to the next. This is the sort of thing that makes the movie clearly bad, but also secretly kind of good because you can laugh at the badness.
The other part that partially bothered me and partially made me laugh at its absurdity was how emotionally vacant all the characters were. A friend would die, then they just moved on with a shrug. Specifically, when one guy they know (he's kind of a jerk and not exactly a friend) dies a gruesome death, one character watches the cell phone video multiple times.
A person snaps his neck, and this character just watches the video with an amused look on his face, like he's watching a dog ride a skateboard. It's messed up.
While this character is clearly the worst of the group, none of them are likable. If a movie is going to show a group of people die one at a time, it needs to convince us that we should care about them at least a little bit. Since the characters are unlikable and therefore difficult to sympathize with, I felt apathetic about their deaths (all except one, which I won't spoil). This is another part of the movie that's so bad that it's funny and secretly kind of good.
Anyway, I'm dissecting this movie too much. The problems with the movie mostly play as funny while watching.
If you want to watch and laugh at a bad scary movie with friends, Truth or Dare is fine. Just make sure you go in with low expectations.
As far as being legitimately good, it's not. It's terrible. It's littered with nonsensical reactions, silly dialogue, and unintentionally hilarious moments. Maybe those weird smiles that every character makes at one point are scary to others, but I found them funny every time.
The movie is pretty straightforward, but I'll give a brief explanation anyway. A group of friends goes to Mexico on spring break. While there, a stranger invites them to play truth or dare in a creepy abandoned church. It turns out that the game is possessed by a demon who follows them and forces them to continue playing the game until every player is dead. Fail a dare, you die. Tell a lie, you die. Refuse to play, you die.
The game and movie are essentially Jumanji crossed with Final Destination. It's PG-13, so it's not nearly as graphic as Final Destination, which I didn't mind.
It all sounds simple enough. But, the filmmakers still changed the rules throughout the movie and also radically changed what we knew about the characters. Maybe these changes were supposed to indicate that the game reveals our true selves and all the previous information was false. But that doesn't totally work because even characters who know nothing about the game change drastically from one scene to the next. This is the sort of thing that makes the movie clearly bad, but also secretly kind of good because you can laugh at the badness.
The other part that partially bothered me and partially made me laugh at its absurdity was how emotionally vacant all the characters were. A friend would die, then they just moved on with a shrug. Specifically, when one guy they know (he's kind of a jerk and not exactly a friend) dies a gruesome death, one character watches the cell phone video multiple times.
A person snaps his neck, and this character just watches the video with an amused look on his face, like he's watching a dog ride a skateboard. It's messed up.
While this character is clearly the worst of the group, none of them are likable. If a movie is going to show a group of people die one at a time, it needs to convince us that we should care about them at least a little bit. Since the characters are unlikable and therefore difficult to sympathize with, I felt apathetic about their deaths (all except one, which I won't spoil). This is another part of the movie that's so bad that it's funny and secretly kind of good.
Anyway, I'm dissecting this movie too much. The problems with the movie mostly play as funny while watching.
If you want to watch and laugh at a bad scary movie with friends, Truth or Dare is fine. Just make sure you go in with low expectations.