Gone - (but definitely not forgotten)  

Average. That's how I see most films these days - Hollywood churning out more of the same - the same sort of horror films, the same sort of comedies, the same sort of superhero movies. Some are good and stick in your mind, others just fall into that big pit of car crashes and shoot-outs somewhere in the back of your mind as they merge together.

`Gone' is average. There is little special here - a girl, who may or may not have been kidnapped and escaped from a serial killer, loses her sister and is convinced the killer has come back for her. Is she mad, or telling the truth? However, despite an overall `seen-it-all-before' feel to its synopsis, ‘Gone’ isn't actually that bad.

It had a certain something that, although it's only an average movie, at least managed to hold my attention for the ninety minutes. It had a good story. The characters weren't totally stupid and kept running back into burning houses and stuff. Then it was all nicely wrapped up at the end.

I guess if it does have a ‘weakness’ then it falls into that same trap that the ‘Scream’ movies do, i.e. all the supporting characters act a bit weird and dodgy.  This is to make us – the audience – wonder whether they’re really the killer, playing some sort of sick ‘stalk-and-get-to-know’ game with our protagonist while she befriends them, blissfully unaware of their true motives.  Perhaps my main criticism would be that it seems to end a little too abruptly.  No sooner do we establish who's who and what's really going on, does it seem to be over.  At least there's clear resolution, but the ending could hardly be described as 'epic' because of this.

You may have watched a million similar movies, but, if you think you might like the sound of this one, give it a go - you might be right (plus, Amanda Seyfried and Jennifer Carpenter are in it - so maybe it's just one for the lads).

7/10 if I woke up on Groundhog Day and had to watch this again, I could live with that