Like most slashers, MY BLOODY VALENTINE 3D isn’t great art or even great horror cinema, but it proves that with a little showmanship, you can have no problem sitting back and enjoying yourself or recommending it to friends. This is not one of those instances where you can tell people to wait for the DVD, because without the 3-D experience (especially if the theater is packed with fellow fans), it would lose its luster and what you’d be left with, while decent, is nothing too special. But once you put on those 3-D glasses, you’ll be dodging pickaxes and shielding yourself from blood that doesn’t quite make its way from the screen onto you, and that’s what MY BLOODY VALENTINE 3D is really all about. I’m not sure if nothing says date movie like a 3-D ride to hell, but a good time at the movies like this will certainly give you something to remember past Valentine’s Day.
The most obvious critique applied to pretty much any 3-D movie is, would this film work as well without the 3-D? In most instances the answer is no, and in the case of MY BLOODY VALENTINE 3D, that’s more or less the case
Take the 3-D out of it and VALENTINE is really no different from average direct-to-DVD slasher fodder, albeit not a bad example by any means. And as the current slate of remakes goes, this new MY BLOODY VALENTINE measures up decently to the original, which was neither the best nor the worst of the lot (though it works better now as a nostalgia piece), and is a fairly respectful retelling. But all of this is irrelevant, since the new BLOODY VALENTINE was made to be seen and experienced in three dimensions (the first horror film shot with the Real D process) and this is what gives the film the large majority of its entertainment value. If you don’t experience this one in a theater in 3-D, you’ll be missing out on all the fun.
The casting is actually a big help, and the performers all acquit themselves nicely under the circumstances: SUPERNATURAL’s Jensen Ackles is able to keep his character’s sanity questionable while still giving us a reason to care for his plight, while Jaime King takes her somewhat thankless role beyond being a mere scream queen, and Betsy Rue has a memorably lengthy full-frontal nude scene that she plays so well, you eventually forget the nudity and focus on the scene (and considering how good she looks, that’s saying something). But it’s old pros Kevin (LOST) Tighe and the great Tom (CREEPSHOW) Atkins who add real zest to the film, and it’s especially wonderful to see Atkins back in the horror genre again, almost as if nothing has changed. It’s also to the film’s credit that his casting doesn’t serve as just an in-joke for the fans, but as simply getting the best actor possible for the role.
Of course, it’s the last part of MY BLOODY VALENTINE 3D’s title that is the film’s real raison d’etre. Say what you will about the overall feature, but you can’t deny that director Patrick Lussier delivers the 3-D goods, but real good. Lussier is also Wes Craven’s editor and he certainly knows his pacing, but VALENTINE’s opening 15 minutes are so enjoyably over-the-top, and know how to meet audience expectations so well, that once the film settles down into its story, the director’s already got us where he wants us. There’s at least one cool dimensional highlight per reel, and the movie piles on so much gore that you have to wonder what the MPAA saw before VALENTINE that made them so jaded that they gave this one a pass. It’s delightfully old-school in the blood-’n’-guts department, and while there may not be as memorable a death as the laundromat scene in the previous version (though Rue’s nude demise comes pretty darn close), the filmmakers take so much delight in delivering all the mayhem in 3-D that it easily brushes the film’s shortcomings aside.
