i know i wasted 90 mins of my life.

Disturbing yet enthralling

It's a good bad... and worth a popcorn matinée. While it's easy to lament what could have been...

The movie is wonderful and true, an act of love in all its contradictions and complexity

When I saw Marina Sirtis in the opening scenes I thought that she looked familiar, but couldn't pinpoint where I saw her. But then I checked her bio and realized she was in one of those really awful "Star Trek" spin-offs. Naturally, she gets cast in a cheesy horror/drama/comedy(?). The movie was so forgettable that I kept focusing on Marina's lips, simply because they look exactly like Meg Ryan's, post-lip-enlargement. And Lauren Birkell looks a lot like Thora Birch.Anyway...The movie promises at the very outset that it will do its best to rip off "The Sixth Sense" and it doesn't disappoint in that regard. However, while TSS remains somber throughout, something strange happens in this low-budget little movie: half-way through the film, the characters get quite smart-ass-like, things get decidedly tongue-in-cheek, so for a moment there I thought this might become a sitcom. However, dormant comedic passions of the writer and actors settle down, and the movie ends dramatically, without comedy.The problem with this movie is that after the quick, effective introduction, things move at a slow pace. Plus, there are several scenes that do very little for the plot or characters but just serve as fillers. There are also lines in the dialogue that sound awkward. The best example would be the black psychic saying "How dare you?!" to the shrink; I thought that was worthy of a MST3K stinger! More problems come in the form of bad acting, and I'm referring to the Asian kid and his father. And guess whom they cast in this "serious" movie to play the long-lost Daddy? That IDIOT from that 90s MTV dating show with Jenny McCarthy! What were they thinking? Btw, that "hot-shot" is the son of a bowling "legend". I know, I know: yet more nepotism in movies. And yes, I KNOW: "bowling" and "legend" can't possible go together, it's an oxymoron.For a movie that is about ghosts, lost souls, and haunted houses where things go "bump", there sure is a severe lack of atmosphere. When a cup of coffee is spilled on the ground it's just boring. The movie just looks and feels flat. As flat as Keira Knightley's pitiful pair...

Soul Survivor (listed as Spectres on IMDb) is a little different than a lot of movies I see on Lifetime Movie Network. This is a tale of a teenage girl, Kelly (Lauren Birkell), who is lonely and depressed, as her father has passed away and her mother, Laura Lee (Marina Sirtis), is too self-involved. After Kelly attempts suicide, Laura Lee takes her to live in a home in the country for the summer. Before even settling in, Kelly meets a mysterious boy and she begins to experience unusual happenings in the house.I liked this movie but I had to pay close attention, as it seemed a little choppy in places and it had a lot going on. Lauren Birkell does a nice job, as does Alexis Cruz. Marina Sirtis' character is annoying but I suppose she is supposed to be that way for the story. She does give a realistic portrayal, though.

An uncovered Gem! This is a great movie! The trailer sucked, and gave me the impression that it's a low-budget piece of crap with a great...no, AWESOME cast! Curious I got it...I was VERY surprised. Linda Park, (Hoshi from Enterprise) is in it, Marina Sirtis (Troi of Star Trek: TNG), Dean Haglund (Langly, of the Lone Gunmen from The X-files), the sexy Alexis Cruz from Stargate (the film & SG-1), and Tucker Smallwood who has been in so many movies and every major sci-fi TV show in the past decade! The movie had an intelligent story, and though it's called Spectres, it was more about a mother struggling to make life with her teen daughter as close to normal as possible after a suicide attempt. The supernatural aspect is a fresh view (which is rare) on the subject of hauntings. The best thing of all (and worth getting the DVD on its own) was the surprise goose-flesh-raising filming of an actual ghost during a take and can be seen in special features. This is indeed a GEM that needs to be uncovered.

With the name and the description, it's easy to mistake this as being another edge-of-your-seat, thrill-ride horror movie. It's anything but. Apart from having a supernatural aspect to it, it's pretty much an after-school special sort of film. Its PG-13 rating isn't even needed. The suicide element is so brief and tame, that this could still easily be rated G (remember, G doesn't have to mean kids, it just means General Audiences). The interesting thing is that, when the credits finally rolled, I was satisfied with what I'd seen. Imagine that, a movie that doesn't go for the kill and just wants to entertain you with a decent story for an hour or two. The script is...OK, the dialogue is... acceptable, the acting is good, for the most part (this movie is rife with underrated actors that are much more talented than they've ever been given credit for). What I find interesting is that everyone comes across as real people. Not "good actors," just your regular, flawed bozos found on every street corner. When Julia Roberts or Tom Cruise are on a screen, you get drawn-in, but it's always "them." Marina Sirtis, on the other hand, makes you believe you're watching a typical house-mom type, not an actress, who's both kind and overbearing under different circumstances --just as a real person might be. There's a scene towards the end that'll have you wanting to give her a medal for realistically portraying someone in emotional agony, and not simply "oh, the script says I'm supposed to scream here." So, overall it's not a blockbuster, and it's not something you'll want to rush out and tell your friends about. Heck, some of the metaphysical/religious concepts used are so... well, let's just say I don't subscribe to them and politely leave it there, suffice to say they're a bit corny and detracting, in an amalgamated "I've read a lot of spiritual books, but don't really know a thing about it" sort of way. But, I gave this one an "8" score for one very good reason: It accomplished what it set out to do, and it did leave me happy that I'd watched it. With Hollywood pumping out multi-million dollar blockbusters with tons of FX and no story on a regular basis, how often can we really say that about a film these days?