Walled In

Sometimes I just download movies because after you read the description of them you think you might find something interesting. The same night I downloaded 'Rec' and 'Quarantine' I found 'Walled In', another thriller centered on a building. This time it a cement apartment building a weird architect built in the middle of the farmland in some Midwestern state. Because he was so eccentric, the building has 'secrets' and was the sight of horrific murders where people were entombed in the walls of the structure as per some architectural alchemy beliefs. The opening scene of a little girl being drowned in cement by an unknown killer was enough to cause me to pause this and go onto other things. I didn't expect to continue. I really hate to see that kind of stuff happen to kids in movies. But boredom set in so I pressed play. Its a few years later (in movie time not my lifetime) and a female engineer (played by Micha Barton) specializing in demolition has been sent by her family's company to do the report on the building so it can be blown up. Now I should be honest and say she was unrecognizable to me until I started this review. She look familiar but the Micha I remember was from the O.C. where she always looked too old to be playing a teen. Here she looks like a woman in her late twenties. Go figure. Maybe it was better I didn't put two and two together. I really have no use for the Linsay Lohan style wreck that her personal life has become and for sure I wouldn't have bothered watching anything with her in it. But..eh. So the story sends her to this creepy building in the middle of nowhere that was so obviously built to be a set that could be destroyed. I figured that out once I was told why she was going there in the first place. Knowing that kinda takes the edge off the suspense. Anything happening will be influenced by THAT ending. Of course, there are still people living at this 'Bates Motel' style cement apartment building. They include an old woman, an ill middle aged black guy and a gloomy mother/caretaker (Deborah Kara Unger) and her equally gloomy and weird son. The son is played by Cameron Bright of 'Ultraviolet' and 'X-Men 3' fame. This kid could easily have a whole career playing creepy. He has that look. The caretaker's husband was one of the people entombed all those years ago. The woman has issues. Why is it that anyone found in places like this ALL have to be off their nut? Add Micha's character's bf who shows up later in the film and you got all the suspects you need for the mystery to be developed. Well there is a dog but I didn't make him to be guilty of anything 'cept snausage breath. The building is full of secret passages and general weirdness and there is much running through maze like corridors in the dark, complete with faulty flashlights, to increase the feeling of 'dread'. We eventually find out WHY people were entombed and why the caretaker and her son are so strange. Eh. There is a twist that I admit I didn't see coming but again it was all in service of the big demolition that we all know is imminent. I could just imagine the director and the producers in a 12th degree bum pucker hoping that when they had to destroy their set for their big finish that everything went as planned and there was film in the cameras. I admit waiting for this demolition was the only thing that kept me going to the end. That and the fact that I hate to not finish a movie once I start one. I have only done that twice in my life (for 'Maximum Overdrive' and 'Space Balls'). I figure I owe the filmmakers at least that much. But not these filmmakers. Suffice it to say that they DO NOT destroy the building at the end and I felt totally ripped off. I thought about not saying that in this review but fuck them. No one else needs to be jerked off like that. You create this piece of crap and then you leave me hanging? Have your laugh at my expense. It seems Karma is a bitch and this time her name is Micha Barton. Its energies are directed squarely at me. That is the lesson you can take from this review bitches. Don't dis a piece of shit actress in your blog least you accidentally have your time wasted by one of her direct to video movies. More proof there is not a god but there is a Universe that remembers and repays. Well played Cosmos...well played. You did give me a great ending for this post though.