The Gravedancers (DVD, 2007)

I think Canada has Hollywood rethinking horrors and Grave Dancers is proof! Real smart folks in the horror movie world, Lions gate with Grave Dancers puts the premium dollars into story line, special effect, costume, etc... NO CHEAP stuff! What they do to subsidize the cost is get 'High quality' acting and a cast without the necessarily 'designer' big names. GOOD talent but reasonable to budget and the actors REALLY want to do it!! That's what made Grave Dancers awesome. Just review the commentary on the making of the film (extras) you'll see what I mean. Hey, Sarah Michelle Gellar could have played the wife role easy. It also would have cost the film an extra 10 million dollars! there goes the profit, the effects, the rest of cast, design. There goes a good horror. Nothing against the Hollywood superstars, but in Horror, we need to be lenient. LOWER YOUR acting PRICE! Did 'The Grudge' really sell that much?? NO!

OK, The movie itself now (-: Dominic Purcell (of “Prison Break” and “Blade: Trinity”) plays Harris McKay, a successful lawyer who lives with his wife Allison (Clare Kramer, who played Glory on “Buffy”) in wedded bliss. But when an old friend dies in a car crash and Harris is reunited with his old college pals Kira (Josie Maran) and Sid (Marcus Thomas), their life together turns from from paradise to paranormal. Kira, Harris, and Sid visit their pal’s grave in the middle of the night, drink and reminisce, and find a strange greeting card with an oddly inspiring poem. Caught up in the moment and the spirit of the words, the group reads the poem aloud and dances to a boombox in tribute to their friend and the time they have left together. Little do they know, the words on the toxic Hallmark card were not harmless sentiments, and they’ve accidentally activated an ancient “gravedancing curse” that make their lives a living hell!!!!

Things start with strange sounds here and there and the tendency of doors to open and close on their own. But soon there’s someone playing the piano when no one’s in the living room and a strange, delirious woman appears in their bedroom, and then vanishes into thin air. Harris and Allison contact the others to see if they are screwing with them (Kira apparently had a bit of a tendency to stalk Harris before he married Allison), they find that Kira has been beaten and assaulted almost to death in her trashed house, and Sid has a team of paranormal scientists in his apartment investigating a series of spontaneous fires that spring up out of nowhere. In short, these folks are all haunted.

As the three learn the situation (they’ve disturbed the spirits upon whose graves they danced, and now those three ghosts have one lunar cycle to get back at them), the attacks become more frequent and more violent. The paranormal experts might have a way to reverse the curse – but will they complete the ritual in time, and will it even work? As things get more desperate and the spirits get stronger, things get far more complicated than expected – soon enough there are explosions, crashes, flying objects, possessions, and assorted supernatural goings on.

Only negative thing I have to say: it's long (it does get a little draggy and repetitive in the last half-hour) and nobody gets naked. But, I'll take a smart, fresh script, assured direction and a great cast over some skin anyday. Fans of spooky classics like “Poltergeist”, “Legend of Hell House”, and “The Entity” This is up your alley. Don't miss this!