I used to have this friend in college, and she used to come up with the weirdest scenarios. It would be 2:00am and she’d text my phone saying, “Miiiiiiike, if someone told you that you had to eat your dog or kill a baby, what would you do?” Needless to say, I stopped talking to her! But, still, Choose is very reminiscent of some of the situations this girl proposed to me. What would you do if you had to choose the better option out of two choices that would most definitely leave you scarred for life or result in the death of someone else?
Choose is a psychological horror film about a psychopath who traps victims and makes them choose between two options, both options being absolutely horrible and stomach churning. There is always a consequence, so victims can never refuse to play the game. As soon as the attacks start, a young college student studying journalism starts getting ominous instant messages and bloody pictures of the attacks from an unknown person. She joins her father and the rest of the police in the search for the killer so they can stop him before he strikes again.
The film starts off really great, but in a bad way at the same time. The opening choice is so terrible; I don’t know how anyone could go through that. However, I feel that all the creativity was used on the opening scene because all the other choices aren’t that hard. This could either mean I’m sick and twisted, or the script just wasn’t that great. In a way, the film switches midway from a horror flick to a mystery.
There were a couple times near the beginning of the film that I was thinking, “Why did they film it this way?” But, this is just my criticism as a guy with a B.A. in film. The volume tends to dip very low and increase quickly for no reason. Scenes for a film are not shot in chronological order. So, maybe there were problems with production, or there were problems with the signals sending the film to my television. At least the cast were great, too. Katheryn Winnick, Kevin Pollak, and Bruce Dern were perfect choices to fit the roles in the film.
Choose is available On Demand, in the Same Day As Theatres section. I agree that the film is worth the $7 it costs you to view it. Mostly my problems with this film come from a film major standpoint, but in reality, Choose is really good. It’s probably one of the best psychological horror films I’ve seen in a long time. There is also a ‘one, two punch’ type of twist during the film that I was like, “Oh, damn.” Go watch it for yourself and see what I’m talking about.
