TRUTH OR DARE REVIEW
April 15 2018
Truth or dare. A teen horror with a promising concept. Truth is it is awful and not at all daring.
Blumhouse can produce good low budget horrors such as The Purge or Sinister. Although, this film could be the production house’s biggest blunder.
The story follows Oliva (Lucy Hale) is a good student hoping to join a volunteer project in Summer. Her spontaneous friend Markie (Violet Bearne) persuades Oliva to join the group on their spring break trip to Mexico by offering to help with the project.
On their last night of the trip, after meeting a stranger called Carter (Lanson Liboiron), he takes them to play truth or dare in an abandoned church.
The rules are strict. You either tell the truth or you die. You do the dare, or you die. Refusing to play means death. There is no escaping your turn. Just as the group thinks they have left everything behind, the game follows them home.
A demonic creature controlling the game breaks relationships apart. Her friends become her antagonists. Soon enough, the game starts to turn more malicious.
Yet the stakes in this film could have been pushed to the limit. The truths were a classic teen drama scenario: who has feels for who and infidelity. More viewers could have been pulled into the action if the truths were grittier and less pathetic.
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Most of the dares started light-hearted but later became painfully predictable. There was no element of surprise. Nothing overly daring or traumatic. Just horribly cliché.
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Potentially, if the film was higher than a 15 rating, it could have been more creative and detailed with deaths.
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There are no masked killers or anyone running rampant with a chainsaw. Illusions created by the game are people grinning creepily while asking the dreaded words: “truth or dare.”
This was far from scary or impressive.
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One of the characters even described as a “Snapchat filter.” These smiles gained plenty of unintentional comedy.
The promising premise falls flat with the script. Lucy Hale is talented enough especially after her run in Pretty Little Liars and even she can’t save this disaster. The only well-developed character is Markie, who offers the strongest backstory and subplot, with most convincing emotive senses.
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The scriptwriters try desperately to develop characters showing their darkest secrets and how they overcome the situation. But these become thin.
Nothing said seemed convincing and some lines even came across as sarcastic given the situation. This leaves the viewer struggling to sympathise and connect with any of the characters.
Some subplots could have been removable and more time on the main plot of whether the characters can escape the game.
Flashbacks would have been more effective explaining previous games or the entire backstory, adding to the tension and leveling to the extreme games before.
For horror movies, the sound is essential in building up suspense to the scare. Yet sound effects fizzled out and the music never added to the ambiance.
Easily the ending could have been one of the best scenes as it leaves the viewer questioning the game and room for a potential sequel. However, it fails in its execution of the twist, leaving viewers unsatisfied.
Nothing about this production is memorable. If you want a scare to give this one a miss. If you want a comedy, see it.