Dead Mary is set at an isolated log cabin situated deep in the woods. Couples Kim (Dominique Swain) & Matt (Jefferson Brown), Lilly (Maggie Castle) & Bryce (Steven McCarthy), Amber (Reagan Pasternak) & Dash (Michael Majeski) plus odd one out Eve (Marie-Josée Colburn) who is on her own have all been invited to the cabin for the weekend by their friend Ted. There they hang out &, well not much else really. Suddenly someone comes up with the bright idea of playing Dead Mary, a campfire tale that states if you say 'Dead Mary' three times into a mirror said deceased female named Mary, who was a Witch when she could be described as Alive Mary, will come back from the dead & kill everyone. No-one really takes it seriously but do it anyway, then by the nights end they begin to wish they hadn't as Matt turns up mutilated in the woods possessed by something evil...
This American Canadian co-production was directed by Robert Wilson & one has to say I though Dead Mary is a rather odd little teen horror film & a not particularly good one either. The script for Dead Mary is credited to Peter Sheldrick & Christopher Warre Smets although according to the IMDb while it started out as a typical teen slasher with a ghostly Dead Mary zombie rising from the lake to kill various teens director Wilson decided to change everything & have some unseen unknown & unexplained evil force possess the teens one-by-one & thus turn it into some sort of modern teens in peril in the woods in a log cabin mix between The Evil Dead (1981) & the body-snatching plot of The Thing (1982) as the second half of Dead Mary plays out exactly the same as John Carpenter's masterpiece with it trying to create a real sense of paranoia & mistrust. To be brutally honest Dead Mary is a mess, the first thirty minutes are so boring it's untrue, after ten minutes & absolutely nothing had happened I was becoming bored, after fifteen minutes I was past bored, after twenty minutes of nothing happening I was praying for some sort of dramatic incident & by the twenty five minute mark & still literally nothing of any significance had happened I had all but given up on it. Upto this point the entire film has been nothing but really dull dialogue between really dull character's, nothing that happens has any relevance to later on anyway which makes it even worse. Eventually the film kicks into gear & the body stealing plot starts to develop, to be fair this part of the film is alright but with such a small cast of character's there's not much the makers could do with the idea, they also reveal who is an evil clone far too easily & it's annoying to see people keep splitting up all the time. Also anyone possessed by whatever is possessing them seems intent on upsetting people by telling them that their boy/girlfriend is cheating on them! It's just odd to see a mutilated Matt for instance just sit there & tell everyone that their lover is cheating on them for no apparent reason. The plot is a bit of a mess, there is no solid or reasonable explanation for anything that happens, the ending is one of those frustrating ones which just cuts to black at a really annoying moment & leaves everything up in the air & whatever happened to Ted anyway?
Director Wilson does alright here actually, the film has a very laid back & lazy feel to it with slow camera moves, lingering shots & a pace that at times if it was any slower the film would be going backwards. The gore levels are none existent, there's a couple of dead bodies, a burnt arm & some blood splatter but this isn't much off a PG. I don't remember any nudity either. The film is well shot with a fair bit of style & I did like the atmosphere of the final twenty odd minutes with the dark woods & pouring rain.
Technically the film is pretty impressive with nice cinematography, there's no quick 'blink & you'll miss it' editing or shaky hand held camcorder shots either. Dead Mary certainly looks nice, it's just a shame the script is a total mess from start to finish. Apparently shot in Ontario in Canada. The acting is pretty good, while not Oscar worthy no-one stands out as being particularly bad & the girls look rather nice which helps.
Dead Mary is a really odd film, the first thirty minutes will put most into a coma while the rest of it is some odd mix of Candyman (1992) with the whole urban myth surrounding saying someone's name three times The Evil Dead & The Thing but doesn't come close to being as good as any of those. I can't really see who would get anything out of Dead Mary I really don't.
This American Canadian co-production was directed by Robert Wilson & one has to say I though Dead Mary is a rather odd little teen horror film & a not particularly good one either. The script for Dead Mary is credited to Peter Sheldrick & Christopher Warre Smets although according to the IMDb while it started out as a typical teen slasher with a ghostly Dead Mary zombie rising from the lake to kill various teens director Wilson decided to change everything & have some unseen unknown & unexplained evil force possess the teens one-by-one & thus turn it into some sort of modern teens in peril in the woods in a log cabin mix between The Evil Dead (1981) & the body-snatching plot of The Thing (1982) as the second half of Dead Mary plays out exactly the same as John Carpenter's masterpiece with it trying to create a real sense of paranoia & mistrust. To be brutally honest Dead Mary is a mess, the first thirty minutes are so boring it's untrue, after ten minutes & absolutely nothing had happened I was becoming bored, after fifteen minutes I was past bored, after twenty minutes of nothing happening I was praying for some sort of dramatic incident & by the twenty five minute mark & still literally nothing of any significance had happened I had all but given up on it. Upto this point the entire film has been nothing but really dull dialogue between really dull character's, nothing that happens has any relevance to later on anyway which makes it even worse. Eventually the film kicks into gear & the body stealing plot starts to develop, to be fair this part of the film is alright but with such a small cast of character's there's not much the makers could do with the idea, they also reveal who is an evil clone far too easily & it's annoying to see people keep splitting up all the time. Also anyone possessed by whatever is possessing them seems intent on upsetting people by telling them that their boy/girlfriend is cheating on them! It's just odd to see a mutilated Matt for instance just sit there & tell everyone that their lover is cheating on them for no apparent reason. The plot is a bit of a mess, there is no solid or reasonable explanation for anything that happens, the ending is one of those frustrating ones which just cuts to black at a really annoying moment & leaves everything up in the air & whatever happened to Ted anyway?
Director Wilson does alright here actually, the film has a very laid back & lazy feel to it with slow camera moves, lingering shots & a pace that at times if it was any slower the film would be going backwards. The gore levels are none existent, there's a couple of dead bodies, a burnt arm & some blood splatter but this isn't much off a PG. I don't remember any nudity either. The film is well shot with a fair bit of style & I did like the atmosphere of the final twenty odd minutes with the dark woods & pouring rain.
Technically the film is pretty impressive with nice cinematography, there's no quick 'blink & you'll miss it' editing or shaky hand held camcorder shots either. Dead Mary certainly looks nice, it's just a shame the script is a total mess from start to finish. Apparently shot in Ontario in Canada. The acting is pretty good, while not Oscar worthy no-one stands out as being particularly bad & the girls look rather nice which helps.
Dead Mary is a really odd film, the first thirty minutes will put most into a coma while the rest of it is some odd mix of Candyman (1992) with the whole urban myth surrounding saying someone's name three times The Evil Dead & The Thing but doesn't come close to being as good as any of those. I can't really see who would get anything out of Dead Mary I really don't.