Review by Quin
If anybody thought there was going to be a subgenre of horror films that take place in dark holes, deep within the earth’s bowels, let me just say that I declare it officially dead. In 2005, The Descent did something truly amazing. It gave us something scary and different; its sequel in 2009 was a total failure. The original My Bloody Valentine from 1981 was great, and that took place in a mine; but its remake was probably the worst remake of them all. So as far as I’m concerned, everything has been said on the subject. Now along comes a film called Abandoned Mine, with its cast of no-name actors (except Alexa Vega who was in Repo! The Genetic Opera, but I didn’t see that and I don’t recognize her), and its first time director and its ridiculous movie poster – all the signs are saying turn back before it’s too late. But I just shrug and say to myself, “What’s one more cave movie?” They do say that your initial impulse is probably the right one. I know some impulsive people that make terrible decisions, but perhaps when choosing which movie to watch, being impulsive is helpful.
Abandoned Mine briefly gets off to a good start. I’ve always thought that in any movie, it’s best to engage the viewer during the credits. White text over a black background while music plays is dreadfully boring and a waste of valuable screen time. I even fast forward now through the opening credits of James Bond movies. So why not start the movie while you tell us quietly and subtly who made the damn thing? Well, Abandoned Mine gets some of the back story out of the way during the opening credits by using old photos and newspaper headlines. We see images of people from the late 1800s as well as words like “Mystery” and “Accident.” Later in the film, the kids elaborate on the tale of people who died in the mine, but they were actually murdered and as a result we have this tale of the Jarvis Mine.
This brings me to the title of the film. Abandoned Mine is lazy and uncreative. It would be the same as calling your restaurant Food. The name of the mine is the Jarvis Mine. There’s a great title right there. Maybe the filmmakers were worried people would think the mine was haunted by Jarvis Cocker, but I doubt it. But surely they could have incorporated it in the title – perhaps The Legend of the Jarvis Mine or Incident at Jarvis Mine. They missed the boat… er… mine car on that one.
The plot of the film is mostly your typical haunted house story – just replace the old house with an old mine. Then insert 5 teenagers – 2 jocks, 2 blondes and an Indian – have them all walk into a mine, and you have a setup for a joke that probably isn’t that funny (or a horror movie that isn’t that scary.) It’s Halloween night and the leader of the group decides to take them to the mine so they can hang out and scare each other with tales of things that happened there exactly 100 years ago. Once it starts raining, the kids move inside the mine. This is where the movie starts to get good. The tone shifts and becomes a bit darker, while the lights go out, disorienting the viewer as well as the characters. The turning point is when one of the jocks has a full blown panic attack brought on by claustrophobia. Things get fairly tense after the group leaves the jock behind while they go get lost looking for who knows what. This sets things up for a twist in the plot. I must admit, I’m pretty mad at myself for not figuring out what would happen. Then there’s another twist and then another one. The movie lost me completely after the first twist. Since they got inside the mine, I had been forming a fairly positive review inside my head, but that all went away when they went and did what they did.
Abandoned Mine is actually quite nuanced in its badness. It wisely avoids being a found footage film, although it clearly wants to be one. When the characters are introduced, we see clips of them, in what appears to be agony or maybe just intense fear, in quick cuts while they are all meeting up for the evening. We also see an unknown figure at a computer, reviewing and compiling the footage. In the mine, they wear helmets equipped with cameras, so we know there will be footage. It’s just nice that we don’t have to be the ones to sift through all of it.
The characters are mostly typical movie teens. The two girls are the most interesting, but not by much. However, what I can not forgive is the way they wrote Ethan, the character from India. He’s written in a way that makes him look clueless. The two jocks use him as the butt of their jokes while the girls defend him. But the use of stereotypes as humor combined with the mean-spirited comments, just makes everybody look bad – especially the writer of this script. I do give credit to actor Charan Prabhakar for doing the best he can with the material. He brings an endearing quality to Ethan.
On one hand, this movie is well made, has some decent moments inside the mine and rarely relies on jump scares. But on the other hand it’s contrived, manipulative, and racially insensitive. Basically, this movie figuratively calls your mother a whore, then just after apologizing, it kicks sand in your face, only to offer to wash your eyes out for you with urine. If that sounds like something you’d be interested in, Abandoned Mine is available now on VOD and iTunes.