At the Movies - 'Final Destination 2'

The Associated Press

Parents keep your children off the highways: What "Final Destination" did for the fear of flying, "Final Destination 2" does for the fear of driving.

Who knows when a 20-car pileup will strike? Oh, that would be Death -- and director David R. Ellis -- who turn a spring break jaunt to Florida into a "Highway to Hell" for a group of unsuspecting teens.

The sequel dives right into the theme of its predecessor: Death gets angry when somebody messes up his master plan -- in this case, a teenager who helps a dozen people avoid a horrific accident because she had a premonition.

But Death won't be denied.

If Death wants you dead, he wants you dead. If you miraculously escape, because of dumb luck or another person's intervention, remain afraid. He wants you dead and he is going to hunt you down.

Oh, and this means you will not die in your sleep. Think: dismemberment. Think: freak accident. You don't have a clue what is in store, but it's coming at you like a freight train -- or a flock of pigeons.

"There's an unseen malevolent force that surrounds us every day and determines whether we live or die," a TV talk show guest pontificates before the teens begin their trip. "In the end, no one can escape Death -- and today may be the day that you die."

The action sequences in "Final Destination 2" are nothing short of spectacular, which makes it easy to ignore the mediocre acting and an uninspiring script that closely follows the original's template.

Ellis -- who honed his skills as a second-unit director on action sequences for "Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone" and "The Perfect Storm" -- builds a deep sense of foreboding by teasing the audience, keeping the camera on an ordinary, seemingly random assortment of cars, trucks and vans as they motor south together, dropping sight and sound clues along the way. (Is that AC-DC's "Highway to Hell" on the radio?)

It's so effective because this is what millions of us do every day: careen down the highway, so focused on our "destination" or our coffee or our CD that we are oblivious to the risks we pose to ourselves and fellow travelers.

Ellis' deft action touch extends way past car wrecks. Even when the audience knows a character is going to buy the farm, they don't know how or when. And if they think they do, they're wrong. Ellis builds a maze of tricky clues (some real, some false), primes the audience past their breaking point, waits another few minutes -- then POW!

No one who has had any personal experience with a car wreck should see this movie.

A.J. Cook ("The Virgin Suicides") stars as Kimberly Corman, the teen in this sequel whose premonitions initially save some people.

Since her friends were among those hunted down after dodging a plane crash in the first movie, she quickly catches on to the pattern. Banding together with highway patrolman Thomas Burke (Michael Landes) and plane crash survivor Clear Rivers (Ali Larter, the only notable holdover from the first film), Kimberly is determined to break the cycle not just for herself but for those whom she has already saved once.

Let's just say Death is on a roll -- and even a wily challenger like Kimberly hardly puts a speed bump in his grand plan.

Released by New Line Cinema, "Final Destination 2" is rated R for gruesome accident scenes, strong language, drug content and some nudity. Running time: 90 minutes.

Two and one half-stars out of four.