Two guys wake up in a strange sewer toilet room and can't remember how they got there. They're chained up and there's a dead-looking guy in between them. It's all a bit disturbing and could have led to a great, tension-filled film, like a stage show, or like Richard Linklater's Tape, where all the action takes place in the same room. Director James Wan ventures out, however, to explain who they are and how they got there in flashbacks and to wedge in some rather crude fright moments. There is a really clever scene where Adam (Leigh Whannell) wanders around his apartment where the lights don't work: the only way he can see what's there is by using the flash on his camera. This could have been a tremulous psychological scare, but piddles about too much and gets a bit silly at times. It seems like the actors - particularly Cary Elwes, who plays Dr Lawrence, the other guy in the room - are enjoying themselves too much, over-acting and thus being melodramatically unconvincing.
Nugget: a rather unsatisfying and not-so-scary movie. The premise was good, but Leigh Whannell's screenplay crashed and burned a little.
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