ThedevilChoose When a movie has you begging for it to end not even half way through it's pure crap. We've all seen this movie and this characters millions of times, nothing new in it. Don't waste your time.

filippaberry84 I think this is a new genre that they're all sort of working their way through it and haven't got all the kinks worked out yet but it's a genre that works for me.

Kien Navarro Exactly the movie you think it is, but not the movie you want it to be.

Lela The tone of this movie is interesting -- the stakes are both dramatic and high, but it's balanced with a lot of fun, tongue and cheek dialogue.

Wuchak RELEASED IN 2010 and directed/written by Wes Craven, "My Soul to Take" is a slasher movie about the high schoolers of Riverton, Connecticut, and the legend that a schizophrenic serial killer will return to murder the teens born the day he died 16 years earlier. It's not clear if the killer actually died (his body was never found, dun, dun, dun) or if his soul will possess one or more of the kids in order to conduct his wicked deeds.I wasn't aware that this was a Wes Craven production while watching (I must've missed it in the opening credits), but the unrealistic tone and general dramatics reminded me of Craven's "Scream" (1996), albeit without the humor. So I wasn't surprised when the end credits revealed this was Wes' baby.I liked how Wes used actors who actually looked like teens and, in some cases, were teens during filming, like Paulina Olszynski, who was not quite 18 playing 16 year-old Brittany, and Emily Meade, who was 20 playing 19 year-old Fang.Zena Grey is on hand as a fundamentalist Christian, Penelope. Unfortunately, as is typical for Craven, Penelope's religiosity is so overdone I busted out laughing at a couple of her melodramatic statements. Memo to Craven: Actual staunch believers rarely talk in that heavy-handed manner to other people, particularly high schoolers, who simply aren't that overt & bold about their Christianity.In any case, the condor-charade-in-the-classroom sequence perked my attention because it was so quirky and compelling. There are some interesting ideas in the script (e.g. the soul of someone who dies passing into someone being born) and I appreciated that this isn't just a slasher flick, but also a coming-of-age high school movie. Max Thieriot & John Magaro emerge as the protagonists (or maybe antagonists), Bug and Alex, and they're competent, but I had trouble getting into the dramatics of the characters. Nothing seemed real; it felt like the Twilight Zone. I suppose it didn't help that some of the story elements are a bit convoluted. It also didn't help that the females, while more than serviceable, lacked sex appeal IMHO.Craven is renowned in horror circles, but he's had his share of clunkers (e.g. 1988's "The Serpent and the Rainbow"). "My Soul to Take" falls somewhere in the middle.THE MOVIE RUNS 108 minutes and was shot in Connecticut (New Milford, Danbury & Tolland).GRADE: C+

Steve Pulaski Wes Craven's My Soul to Take - the last original film he made before he died of brain cancer in 2015 - opens with Abel Plenkov (Raul Esparza), a schizophrenic man who discovers he is also the notorious serial killer known as the "Riverton Ripper" his sleepy town has been trying to catch for some time now. Upon killing his pregnant wife and his psychiatrist, who tries to communicate with Abel as he transcends boundaries of sanity and the opposite, he is shot and killed by police. On the way to the hospital, however, Plenkov unexpectedly awakens and slits the throat of the paramedic, causing a fiery car accident at the side of the road.Sixteen years later, the seven teens who were born the same moment that the Riverton Ripper was killed known as the "Riverton Seven" - comprised of the timid Bug (Max Thieriot), the dweeby Alex (John Magaro), the spacey Jay (Jeremy Chu), the blind Jerome (Denzel Whitaker), the devoutly religious Penelope (Zena Grey), the jock Brandon (Nick Lashaway), and the gorgeous Brittany (Paulina Olszynski) - gather together for the town's ritual "killing" of a puppet made to look like the Ripper in order to prevent his return to Riverton. Despite this ritualistic practice, the teens begin to die off when the Riverton Ripper makes his return to terrorize the town. In the midst of this, we largely focus on Bug, who works with his close friends in order to try and prevent what seems like an inevitable and brutal death.My Soul to Take is as boring as it is almost entirely artless; Craven trades mystery, uncertainty, and imaginative setups for an atmosphere drenched in teal cinematography and bleak visuals that lack everything that should make a horror film engaging and fun. Craven seems to reject everything that made his renowned franchises like A Nightmare on Elm Street and Scream click so well with horror fans, and even his more contemporary efforts like Cursed at least narratively and aesthetically passable, in favor of focusing on a drab palette of generic teen characters and a thoroughly unremarkable story here.In his later years, specifically citing this and Cursed, Craven seemed very fascinated with the idea of characters being spiritually pegged for certain doom, specifically at the mercy of a curse or imminent fate. Cursed was a film that followed a group of teens who succumbed to the sharp bite of a werewolf in a way that was playful, humorous, and often fun because its more horrifying elements were assisted by the sporadic comedy Craven infused in the script. It's a generally pleasant, if imperfect, film. My Soul to Take doesn't even have the audacity to develop the characters we're supposed to sympathize with nor really explain the connection of the death of a random schizophrenic to the premature births of seven babies the same day of his death. However, even if we were privileged to hear an explanation, the approach and justification would probably be so rooted in melodrama that it'd be pathetic and not even worth it.My Soul to Take's biggest crime against itself and its genre is just is general lack of boasting anything of interest. It takes a slew of undeveloped, conventional characters and writes them into a script that doesn't treat them as people, and ultimately, functions largely in a way that emphasize the drab atmosphere more-so than anything else in the film. This is a bitter and uncommonly miserable film, with one of its only redeeming qualities being its ability to maintain a consistent degree of ugliness.Starring: Max Theiriot, John Magaro, Jeremy Chu, Denzel Whitaker, Zena Grey, Nick Lashaway, Paulina Olszynski, and Raul Esparza. Directed by: Wes Craven.

shathar_o i watched this movie because of Max Thieriot and Wes Craven; and because i saw all these negative reviews; well; it wasn't that bad! it has a unique story; with a massive plot-twist; the acting was fine; the cast were put in the suitable place; and Max rocked his Bug role; the first 60 minutes were fine and crazy; but after that; the story was falling off and was super weak; it could have went better but i feel that Craven was a bit bored at the end and he just wanted the movie to finish; some scenes were dumb and not realistic; it's recommended when you're in love with Max Thieriot; you're 16; you're a bored horror fan with some popcorn.

Jackson Booth-Millard The title was certainly catchy, and I was willing to give the film a chance despite the critics only giving it a rating of two of five stars, especially being directed by Wes Craven (The Hills Have Eyes, A Nightmare on Elm Street, Scream). Basically the opens with multiple personality disorder and schizophrenia suffering Abel Plenkov (Raúl Esparza), whose alter ego is The Riverton Ripper, murders his pregnant wife and counsellor Dr. Blake (Bean's Harris Yulin), and later in the night when he dies his seven personalities leave his body and are transferred into the bodies of seven children born on that night. Sixteen years pass, all celebrating their sixteenth birthdays are Adam 'Bug' Hellerman (Max Thieriot), Alex Dunkelman (John Magaro), Jerome King (Denzel Whittaker), Penelope Bryte (Zena Grey), Brandon O'Neil (Nick Lashaway), Brittany Cunningham (Paulina Olszynski) and Jay Chan (Jeremy Chu), and they are having a get together in the area the killer was last seen. One by one during the night the teenagers are being brutally killed by The Riverton Ripper who has returned, five out of seven of the children are slaughtered, and also Bug's adoptive mother May (Jessica Hecht). Police officer Detective Frank Patterson (Frank Grillo) had been investigating the murders sixteen years previously, but he is killed as well, Bug's older sister Leah 'Fang' (Emily Meade) is wounded but survives, and Bug himself is shocked to find out that he is the son of Alan Plenkov, the killer. People have been killed within the Hellerman household by the Ripper, then his best friend Alex crawls through the window, Bug realises the Ripper's soul was transferred into his friend's body, Alex reveals he murdered his abusive stepfather. After a struggle Bug stabs Alex and the soul of the Ripper is sent back to Hell, Bug is sure that he will be arrested being suspected as the killer, but being the last alive he is seen as a hero, all he can do is act up to this. Also starring Dennis Boutsikaris as Principal Pratt, Shareeka Epps as Chandelle and Trevor St. John as Lake. The film started relatively interesting, with the man possessed with a demonic soul, that of a psychopathic murderer, it did sort of interest me the main plot with teenagers killed on the day the killer died, but the plot is too muddled up and filled with complicated bits, apart from some of the deaths and maybe one okay twist it was boring, a disappointing horror thriller. Adequate!