Never Let Go

I can't stand it when a movie gives up its own rules.

Unfortunately, Never Let Go drops the ball, along with the bloodstained machete, just when it should be ramping up the tension.

ever Let Go never manages to answer any of a number of recurring questions adequately, and the movie makes no more sense than one of those head-scratchers by M. Night Shyamalan, which it annoyingly resembles.

French director and horror specialist Alexandre Aja (Crawl, Oxygen) flip-flops awkwardly between several different central ideas, as if the movie is the result of a fractious pitch meeting that was never fully resolved.

A clever horror film that quickly falls into the all too familiar trap of being too clever for its own good.

As with many high-concept horrors, it falls apart as it grasps for an ending, but there's still enough dread, and three great central performances, to just about carry it through.

The creature design is the only component that rises above mediocrity, and one would think Aja, more than two decades into his career, should be past only-a-dream jump scares by now.

It has good ideas and is expertly directed by Aja&#59; if it falters a little, it's because it ends up being too ambitious for its own good. And I'll always prefer a film like that to one that simply settles for the bare minimum. [Full review in Spanish].

Great performances and a beautiful backdrop in a film that just doesn't work.

Never Let Go leads to a satisfying amount of chair-arm gripping anchored by three performances teetering on the edge of greatness.