Largely considered one of the worst movies ever made is German director Uwe Boll’s ‘Alone in the Dark’. Largely considered one of the worst directors ever born is German director Uwe Boll. I’ve seen a few Boll’s in both ‘Blood rayne’ flicks and that ‘Dungeon Siege’ movie, and I gotta admit that they were all pretty bad, but the first ‘Alone in the Dark’ slipped past me… pretty much by design. But in this sequel to that 2005 film Mr. Boll only serves as producer as a pair of directors in Michael Roesch and Peter Sheerer team up to bring us this ninety minute test of one’s personal intestinal fortitude. As bad as the first ‘Alone in the Dark’ may have been, surely it couldn’t have been any worse than this.

Our film opens and takes place in New York City. I know this because it said so on the bottom of the screen and there were a few sky shots of the Empire State Building. That however would be the extent of any New Yorkish type stuff since the rest of the film essentially takes place in various decorated closets. Quite honestly they could have taken sky shots of the Pacific Ocean and claimed the movie takes place in Atlantis because where this movie was located didn’t mean jack to the story. Anyway, three people played by three actors whose work I am very familiar with because I watch a lot of low budget movies in Michael Pare, Natassia Malthe, and Jason Connery are on the run from some kind of mist, and hide out in a bathroom. I mean a New York City bathroom. Cornered, they shoot at this mist repeatedly which does them no good as they get all killed up. Hiding in one of the stalls is some drug dealing dude named Xavier (Zack Ward) who also gets attacked by this thing. I guess.

Now we meet Edward Carnby (Rick Yune) who is… well… we’re never told who or what he is. So Carnby meets up with Xavier, who looks really messed up, with Carnby demanding to see to see these dead bodies, and more importantly a dagger that was left

at the scene of the slaughter. Then Xavier stabs Carnby with this dagger. Then this team of ghost hunters or something shows up to rescue Carnby, more or less, and this is where we learn about this mist that is actually a witch of some sort. Now these ghost hunters have there own story which we won’t get into, but our ghost hunter of interest is the lovely Natalie (Rachel Specter) who we learn that this witch is after for some reason or another. There is also a retired ghost hunter named Abner Lundbert played by the legendary Lance Henriksen who seems to have the 411 about this ghost and why it’s all pissed off and whatnot. This all leads down a meandering path leading to no freaking where and culminating in an incredibly lackluster conclusion.

There’s a scene late in this movie where Edward Carnby is laying on the ground in pain and groans ‘It’s about to begin…’. What’s about to begin Carnby? Seriously dog, fill me in because I don’t have freaking clue. There’s almost nothing even remotely good about ‘Alone in the Dark 2’ which got me to wondering how does a movie, any movie, end up being so messed up? I know that from concept to final edit that making a film is one of the hardest things on the planet earth to do, but there’s really no way to crib any comments about this flick because it is universally substandard. I’m talking basic story elements here such as who in the hell is Edward Carby? He is the primary character in the film and all and filling us in on who he is and what he is would’ve been like sweet. I would suggest a flashback or two from the first film, assuming there is a connection between the two films, but since Christian Slater, who played Carnby in the first flick and Rick Yune aren’t exactly the spitting image of each other, I can see how that may not have worked.

Since our main character has no background then surely our villaness, the ghost does. Or maybe not. All we know about her is that she’s bad and that they are trying to kill her and that somehow this dagger has something to do with something, not that we need to know exactly what. More disturbing is why does everybody have all of this super firepower to shoot at what is basically smoke. Our characters shoot at this mist repeatedly, which obviously has no effect on our smoky witch, but there they go, emptying their clips. Imagine trying to put out a fire by shooting at it. Upon realizing that the fire is still burning, we simply get a bigger gun and shoot at it some more, amazed that our results are the same. There you go.

I can’t be too hard on the actors in this one because Denzel, Streep and Brando – if he weren’t like dead – couldn’t have helped navigate this mismash of a narrative, but nonetheless, the acting was pretty suspect. Rick Yune has a killer set of hip hop abs but he brings nothing to his character of Edward Carnby. But to his defense, he wasn’t given anything to work with either. Rachel Specter is as hot as they come, for real, but she hasn’t learned how to act quite yet. Personally, given the choice, I would much rather be hot and have a killer six pack than be a decent actor anyway. Lance Henriksen, Michael Pare and Danny Trejo have been in a combined 6,285 movies and they do what they do, but the entire film was so nonsensical and uninvolving the even they couldn’t’ breathe any life into it.

Really, I don’t know what more to tell you about this one because it was about as pointless as they come. Other than some halfway decent lighting effects this was easily one of the worst movies I’ve seen this year. Journey at your own risk.