Castigo mortal

The film has a brief moment of promise, introducing a fair premise. Some teens accidentally cause a child's death, and conspire to cover up their dark secret. These guys live in Point Pleasant, WV, home of you-know-who. So the monster will dole out punishment?

The wheels come off quickly. Fast forward several years. A big city reporter, one of the teens visits town, and she is immediately invited to toast the kid she once helped kill (a reunion of all the killers). What? Toast somebody you killed? No comment is possible for such a ludicrous plot device. So let's just pretend the movie didn't do this, and move on.

Enter the stock village idiot. This was the best character, and decently acted (cliches and all). It was cool to listen to his insane ramblings explaining the creature's motives, its weird red eyes, its obsession with mirrors, and his own back story. Best of all was his habit of often firing a shot gun, especially since this guy was blind.

Pop quiz: when learning your presence in a town is causing the deaths, does she: A) Leave town, or B) Stay and fight? Take a wild guess. Using guns. Always works against legendary monsters, right?

But the last 20 minutes are beyond moronic. It's as if the original running time was too short, so a lame "twist" was hastily inserted to explain the profoundly stupid new ending they tacked on. A new director was found at the local pre-school playground, to shot the extra footage. "We thought you were dead!" "Yeah, so did I." Who wrote this, and have they been committed yet?

The Mothman already has more than a few skeptics on whether it exists or not. This movie won't help his status much.