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Odd Thomas

The general consensus about Odd Thomas seems to be thus: critics think it's crap while audiences seem strangely taken with it. Before watching it, I read nothing but bad reviews in magazines, but kept hearing friends of friends saying that it was, "pretty good."

Here's my $.25 take on the movie: I didn't hate it but, the entire time I kept thinking, "I liked this movie better when it was The Frighteners." I also couldn't help feeling like it wasn't as charming as Dead Like Me.

The gist, if you couldn't gather, is as follows: dude sees dead people and commits to helping them. He saves the day but in the end, he has to lose the girl he loves to do it. Sad music plays. Credits roll. The movie, folks, is over.

There were moments that were supposed to be funny that didn't make me laugh. There were tender, sentimental moments that didn't make me care about what happened to the characters. I feel like, overall, Anton Yelchin isn't expressive enough (in his mannerisms or in his delivery of dialogue) to make me believe him, rally behind him, or give a crap about him. And that's not specific to just this movie, his acting style is just flat and wooden. It works in Star Trek but, leaves me wanting more in other instances.

I'll be honest here and admit that I don't know anything about the source material except that Dean Koontz wrote it and he's pretty high up there on the generic, low-brow, horror stuff. Trashing his work is like trashing Stephen King's work - shooting monster fish in a bloody barrel.  I've definitely got better challenges to tackle.

So, the wrap up: all in all, not a complete waste of my night (watched Abandoned Mine two days ago, can't EVER get that time back)!

You can watch the Odd Thomas trailer here:
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