Devour (2005) review by Eric Hyde.

 

                        

                                   "Wake me up from this nightmare... please" - Jake.

"A straight-to-DVD horror movie." You hear that and nothing special comes to mind. You think it will be a low...low budget movie full of bad acting and horrible effects. Now bad acting and low budget effects don't really matter to me all that much, if it's entertaining. Hell, I'm a fan of certain Troma movies for Christ's sake. Devour actually turned out to be pretty good.

Jake (played by Jensen Ackles of Supernatural fame) often has visions/daydreams of violence, murder, self-mutilation and doesn't know why. On his 21st birthday, his best friend signs him up for a computer game called The Pathway. If something bad happens to you, you get a phone call, and things are supposedly "made right." Jake loses his job, and on the phone, tells whoever is calling him that he wants his boss killed. Now this doesn't happen, but his boss is robbed. When he calls the cops and blames it on Jake, the cameras show that the boss was behind it all, when Jake is of course innocent.

Jake finds out his best friend and his girlfriend are also playing The Pathway. However, their phone calls are reminding them how horrible their lives are, leading to murder and suicide. Eventually, everyone Jake comes into contact with is being affected.
  
*SPOILER* Jake finds out that the Devil is behind this, (the reason is revealed later), as the Pathway is also a connection to our world and Hell.

Okay. Sure the premise sounds hokey, and it seems like a rip-off of the Edward Furlong movie, Brainscan. There isn't too much difference. However, the acting is much better (sorry Furlong fans). The production value is surprisingly good, considering that this was straight-to-DVD. There's also some nice gore. When all is revealed, it does leave a little to be desired however. But overall, I did really like the ending. Not the best, but good nonetheless.

I was expecting crap, since I only heard of this movie due to reading a brief thing about it in an old issue of Fangoria. But I ended up pretty pleased. Would I buy it? Eh....if it was cheap at Wal-Mart or Best Buy, most likely. But not if it was full price. Totally worth a watch and a fun way to kill 90 minutes.