Search - Fingerprints on DVD

Creepy kids!

Dolby | Texas | 02/28/2008

(5 out of 5 stars)

"I was able to catch Fingerprints over the weekend at Texas Frightmare Weekend and have already pre-ordered my DVD. This movie rocked! I didn't know what to expect, and I knew it was based on a Texas urban legend, but I was surprised at where the movie took me.

The ghost kids are pretty creepy and it was great seeing actors like Loud Diamond Philips. I must admit I thought I had predicted what was going to happen but I am happy to report I was wrong.

If you're in the mood for a good old fashioned ghost/slasher horror movie then Fingerprints should do the trick."

An Original Horror Movie Centering On The Ghosts Of An Old T

Stephen B. O'Blenis | Nova Scotia, Canada | 07/30/2008

(4 out of 5 stars)

"The title of "Fingerprints" refers to the marks left by the ghosts of dead children when they make their appearance. There was a tragedy in the small town the movie takes place in when, decades ago, a train slammed into a school bus that was stalled on the tracks, killing everyone onboard; in the modern day, there's a legend that if you park a car on those tracks, it will be pushed off the tracks and to safety by an invisible prescence - only fingerprints on the bumper or car's back remain, indicating it was the ghosts of the crash victims, trying to prevent any other accident from occuring on that spot. But what's always apparantly been just an urban legend starts to come true...

The catalyst for the change comes when a girl named Melanie (well played by Leah Pipes) returns home after a stay in an out-of-town hospital. When Melanie and her friends try out the local legend, the car actually does move off the tracks. And shortly thereafter more supernatural occurences start happening. Melanie was in the hospital after an incident that left her legally dead for two minutes; it seems that her brush with death has resulted in her being able to interact with spirits more closely, and once near those haunted tracks... However, things may not be what they seem. It turns out that there are rumors that the crash all those years ago never happened at all, although how or why someone would fake something like that is unknown. In addition to the spirit appearances, new deaths start to occur as an unknown assailant begins slashing through various people connected in one way or another with the tracks and/or the legend.

"Fingerpints" blends its 'haunting' story with 'stalk-and-slash' elements very well, coming out with a distinctive movie based on a fresh storyline. And it does tie the different plot threads together in the end, leaving off with a powerful finale plus an opening for a possible follow-up (which I personally would be in favor of, although it might be tricky to reopen one of the plot threads that seems pretty much resolved). In addition to Pipes's performance, the rest of the cast does a good job too, with Lou Diamond Phillips deserving special mention for his role as a teacher/guidance counsellor at the local high school.

Aside from a couple of film festival appearances, this one went direct to DVD. Direct-to-DVD titles have an unjustly bad rep; personally I've always thought there were quite a few gems in among the weaker entries, but over the last little while the ratio of quality direct-DVD titles has been picking up. With the number of theatrically released horror movies in a bit of a dry spell, it's good to know that the original DVD releases are picking up the slack."

Rent, don't buy--Possible minor spoilers

a customer | CA | 05/14/2008

(3 out of 5 stars)

"Starring Leah Pipes, Kristin Cavallari, Josh Henderson, Andrew Lawrence, Lou Diamond Phillips, and Geoffrey Lewis. I saw the preview for this movie and thought it looked promising--like a decent low-budget ghost story. It starts off interesting enough...a high school girl (Pipes) comes out of rehab and moves to the town of Emerald. Her sister (Cavallari) tells her the train tracks are haunted because a bus full of school children were hit by a train years earlier. She attempts to adjust to her new life and she catches the attention of two of her male classmates (Henderson and Lawrence). Life becomes even more complicated when she starts seeing a girl who had died in the bus crash and so she now must find out what actually happened to the children who died in the crash.

The first half builds like it will be a spooky ghost-story. The second half of the movie is were it falls apart, because all of a sudden it becomes a typical teenage slasher movie--a badly done Nightmare on Elm Street rip-off. The deaths are ridiculous and unoriginal and seem to come out of nowhere. The movie has a very made-for-t.v feel, except for the strong language. The lead actress is quite good and I always love to see Lou Diamond Philips and Geoffrey Lewis; however, some of the other actors inexperience (especially the mother) showed through too much.

Overall, if you know the tale or just want to watch it out of curiosity--rent it first. It's a two-in-a-half star movie, I just bumped it up because of the actors."

Surprising.

Robert P. Beveridge | Cleveland, OH | 10/10/2008

(4 out of 5 stars)

"Fingerprints (Harry Basil, 2006)

You've heard of the After Dark Horrorfest, right? Eight movies supposedly "too scary to be released in theaters" every year that are actually one step above (or, in some painful cases, one step below) Sci-Fi Channel Original Movies? Well, every once in a while I run across a movie that would have been absolutely perfect for After Dark that they somehow missed, probably because it's too well-made to actually bear the title-- it would make all the really mediocre movies look even more mediocre than they actually are. Fingerprints struck me this way; it's not all that good a movie, being both entirely unscary and entirely predictable, and thus it's perfect After Dark fodder, but it's well-made and well-acted enough that it would stand out in a typical After Dark lineup like a glowing beacon of sanity.

Melanie (Pixel Perfect's Leah Pipes, all grown up) gets out of rehab and heads back home-- except "home" is now somewhere different, as her family moved to a new town while she was locked up. Her bubbly sister Crystal (Kristin Cavallari of the upcoming Green Flash in her first big-screen appearance) tries to help Melanie fit into the new digs as much as possible, but word got out, and the kids in her new high school already think of her as a freak. It doesn't help that it seems she sees ghosts. The town's local urban legend involves leaving one's car in neutral on a set of railroad tracks, which will encourage the ghosts of a number of children who died in a horrible bus/train collision in the fifties to push your car off the tracks, leaving fingerprints on your bumper if you've coated it in baby powder (thus the movie's name). Everyone knows it's just an urban legend (in the movie, anyway-- I've seen at least two claims that this is based on a true story, both of them, of course, in different towns), but Melanie befriends a shy youngster named Julie, who, it turns out, is not at all what she appears to be. Worse yet, kids are disappearing. Can Julie-- and, through her, Melanie-- figure out what's going on before she becomes the target?

Yeah, it's a pretty standard mystery with supernatural elements, but nothing here feels clichéd, the way that such things often do. Pipes is a decent actress, and the Cleveland Brothers' (Souls' Midnight) script gives her a good, meaty part to sink her teeth into. There's also a strong supporting cast, including Lou Diamond Phillips in his best role (as a hapless guidance counselor) in close to a decade, and Geoffrey Lewis, one of those character actors who always seems to show up at just the right time (he also showed up in one of the better After Dark releases, Wicked Little Things, the same year this was released).

A very enjoyable film all around, and one that you probably missed, given that theatrically it showed on just two screens (horror film festivals in New York and LA). It found its way to DVD earlier this year; hunt it down and give it a chance. You'll be glad you did. *** ½

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