~Stephen King Bag Of Bones PT 2 Review~!

Well..finally here is my review of part 2 of Bag Of Bones.

To START off I'd just like to say that contrary to what many other reviews were online, I actually liked the movie. I thought that it was a tad-less boring than the usual made-for-tv Stephen King flick. Like I have said many times before, I am NOT a fan of Kingdom Hospital(another Stephen King flick). That movie just kept going and going and going...and it lost me about an hour due to confusion and just pure boredom.
Back to Bag of Bones: Though there was a LOT of talking between characters going on, the development of the story moved on at a pretty good pace. Revealing things quite quickly but at the same time taking 10 minutes of screen time to do so. At the beginning of the 2nd half I was fueled by my eagerness to find out more about the visions that Mike had been having, and fortunately I didn't have to wait long for answers to be revealed. The first person to reveal these answers was his cleaning lady, who shows up once AGAIN at the perfect time to see Mike lose his cool a second time. After a little persuasion by the stunningly old Mike Noonan she reveals information about, "The Curse of Dark Score Lake....the legend...the kind of stories told round the campfire..it's when people go mad."  and of course the appropriate question that was asked next is, What do people do when they go Dark Score crazy?. && in this town instead of just locking yourself in your house and owning a lot of cats, crazy is defined as killing your female kin(apparently this is a trend that is ongoing in China). This curse has plagued the lives of certain residents in the past that are listed below:

• Maddie's husband Lance trying to kill their daughter Kyra by drowning her
• Buddy's dad held his little sister under the water pump and drowned her
• Dill dean's father Fred held Billy's little sister when they were young under water at Dark Score Lake
• But Who's next?

The only drawback to all this information being revealed in the movie was that at the end of the day..or movie should I say...it wasn't that great of a reveal. There was such a lack of an awesome resolution to all the mystery they had done so well of building up to. I was actually very disappointed with the 2nd half of the movie because of this, because it made predicting from beginning to end the "DARKNESS" of Dark Score Lake and its past so easy. After the first 10 minutes of the 2nd half I could already predict what had happened to Sara Tidwell and how the town was involved in her death. I probably could have even guessed what happened to her after seeing the first half of the movie. Once again in a movie the tiring plot, of a town with secrets and people who in the past committed a wrong that they are now dealing with in the present is being played out here. I can't tell you how many times I've seen this situation in a movie, and in this movie they did little to make it stand out from the rest. In this situation, the curse was placed by Miss Sara Tidwell on all those who played a hand in the death of her and her daughter(who was an innocent bystander). The scene of her death was very brutal to watch, so seriously if anybody has a sensitivity to domestic abuse/rape situations, proceed with caution. It is in this scene that Sara says, "You and your kin are cursed. You and your sons are going to do to you daughters what you done to mind. With your own hands you will murder your own daughters, until you are all gone." It is because of the involvement of Mike's grandad in her death that now he must suffer if he has kids..ahem..wasn't he supposed to have one up until the mother got pummeled by a bus!? Well, with the reveal of the curse of Sara Tidwell also came the reveal of why his wife Jo was truly keeping her pregnancy a secret; to protect her unborn child and Mike from harm. Guess she's not a trifling ho after all like Mike had suggested for 2 hours of the movie. The reveal of his wife's secret was probably the only fact that came as a surprise to me aside from a few surprising scenes, because I really had thought she had cheated on her ignorant husband with his gay brother she had been spotted with. Along with this shocking fact came a few deaths that were also "good" unsuspecting surprises. A sudden death of a main character actually shocked the sh*t out of me and scared me a lil'(just a lil). I liked this scene in the movie though for many reasons. 1) it brought my full attention back to the movie (&& took it away from twitter's sick grasp over my mind) 2) it providing the 2nd half with the much needed twist 2 make it a bit unpredictable && 3) it helped to explain the quote, "Custody has it's responsibilities"(an underlying theme in the 2nd half)
The other death, was more of suicide, but all can be explained when you see the film.
Now to get to the end summation of the whole film. One of the best parts of this film I believe were the quotes said by a variety of characters that really made you intrigued with their meanings and helped to play a crucial part in the mystery of the film. Such quotes as,

• "This thing was always bigger than you", 
• "People Don't take kindly to having their secrets spilled",
• "A person without secrets is like a scarecrow without stuffing",
• && "I'm going to give you once chance to save your soul". 

One of the most important quotes in this movie being, "Lie still Bag of Bones". The "Bag of Bones" concept was brought up multiple times during the film. It was first mentioned when Mike had described himself as being a bag of bones with no purpose in the first half of the film. Then in the 2nd part of the film is when a novel of words was written on his laptop solely consisting of the words, "Lie Still Bag of Bones". Though this made no sense at first, this would ultimately be the resolution to the curse and the overall conflict of the movie. The way that the movie was resolved can be summed up in any episode of Supernatural.

 
Overall, I'd have to give this movie a solid 3.5/5.
It was awesome to see Pierce Brosnan on the screen again, though he disappointed me at times with his lack of mojo && his ridiculously acted "crying" scenes.. && the lil actress who played Kyra is just so damn cute && good at her role that it was a pleasure just watching her on my nice HD TV. The plot of the story was enough to keep you watching until the story unraveled and revealed itself, && the fact that you cared for Kyra && wondered where the curse will take things made it watchable till the end. There were about 3 scenes that could maybe make you jump out of your comfy couch, but there was much time in between these scenes, so for avid horror fans this may not be your top priority on your DVR. The reveal of the mystery and secrets is sub-par though the buildup is great && there are many things that make this movie both good and bad. In my opinion, I'd say just watch it to say you did and I promise you that you won't come out feeling like you wasted 4 hours of your life. (Though don't watch it all in 1 night--separating the 2 parts makes the 2nd half more entertaining and you feel less as though the movie was dragging on as well).

Similarity to The Shining:

• Setting of the story made people go crazy: For Jack Nickelson in The Shining it was the Overlook Hotel && for Mike Noonan && the other victims it was Dark Score Lake.
• Family Members were always the victims: In The Shining the families of the Caretakers during the winter for the hotel were always the victims, being killed off before the end of the winter. && in Bag Of Bones it was the father's killing their daughters.
• The father is always the crazy/vulnerable one who ends up killing.