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Vacancy film review
VACANCY
Running time: 80 mins
Starring: Luke Wilson, Kate Beckinsale
Given the litany of horrors that have transpired in motels during the course of movie history, it's a wonder anyone ever stays in one. Vacancy provides yet further evidence why these roadside rest stops, along with cigarettes, should post a warning that they hazardous to your health. Instead of the normal selection of in-room entertainment provided, the Pinewood Motel featured in Vacancy offers unwitting guests the chance to star in their own movie. Unfortunately for them, it's a snuff movie. Like the slogan for the popular cockroach trap Roach Motel, the Pinewood's slogan should be, 'They check in, but they never check out.'
With a good premise and two engaging leads in Kate Beckinsale and Luke Wilson, Vacancy sets out auspiciously enough, but with the prospect of an absorbingly scary second act looming, it suddenly heads off on a typically dumb trail of clichéd and ludicrous plot twists. Director Nimrod Antal and writer Mark L. Smith are uncertain of what tone to strike, with the result Vacancy hits a discordant note.
Whenever entering the realm of this type of thriller, a certain degree of leniency is required with regard to credulity, but so glaring are some of the oversights and so irrational some of the decisions, that Vacancy is reliant upon a complete suspension of disbelief. Films are invariably only as good as their weakest moment. Vacancy initially offers the prospect of elevating itself slightly above such typically under-achieving frighteners, but long before its corny ending, it evaporates all the misplaced hope engendered by its beginning.
It starts out with echoes of Who's Afraid Of Virginia Woolf's matrimonial acrimony as Amy (Kate Beckinsale) and David Fox (Luke Wilson) bicker viciously following the recent death of their only child. "Why didn't you just stay on the interstate," she snaps as their car makes alarming noises while heading down a dark deserted road. "I guess I just wanted to make this as miserable as possible," he fires back, sardonically. When the car eventually gives out, they walk to the nearby isolated and rundown Pinewood Motel, where the are greeted by Mason (Frank Whalley), the creepy owner who insists on them staying in the Honeymoon Suite, waiving the extra $5 upgrade. The grim cockroach-infested room appears to have neither been cleaned nor decorated anytime in the past 30 years.
Looking to unwind after their stressful ordeal, and with every channel on the ancient TV offering nothing but static, David pops in an unmarked video cassette lying by the VCR. The graphic images on the tape of two girls being brutally murdered are disturbing enough, but even more chilling is the realization that the room in which the murders are being committed looks very much like their motel room. This belief is confirmed after the couple view the stack of equally gruesome videos and come across hidden cameras in the room.
As David watches the unfolding horrors on screen, he utters disbelievingly, "This has to be some kind of joke, right?" At this point Vacancy was anything but. It was only a short time later his words proved all too prophetic.
Kevin Murphy
