Devour (2005)

Directed by: David Winkler

Starring: Jensen Ackles, Shannyn Sossamon, Dominique Swain, Teach Grant, William Sadler, and Alan Ackles

Genre: Horror, Thriller, Supernatural, Occult

Rated: R

On his twenty-first birthday, Jake Gray's best friend signs him onto "The Pathway," an internet game where players provide their personal information and get calls from the game telling them to do things. Not long after Jake is signed into "The Pathway" things begin to take a turn for the worse, he loses his job, he begins to have violent visions depicting him harming his loved ones and himself, and his friends begin to die off. As things become progressively weirder, Jake becomes determined to find out what is behind the strange occurrences in town and the deaths of his friends. But Jake will soon find that sometimes the truth is better left untold.

Despite Jensen's numerous warnings at various conventions, this movie isn't as terrible as it could have been. I went into this expecting a disaster. What I got was a flawed, mediocre attempt at a thrilling occult story involving Satanism and devil-worship. Mr. Ackles and I may have different tastes as to what constitutes a terrible film, but after some of the horrible flicks I've sat through, this just rates as "meh."

The story seems to have a slight identity crisis. It starts off with the evil internet game seeming to slowly change the behavior of those who have signed in. It seems to prey upon the hidden secrets, insecurities or fears residing within the players and convinces them to do something about these things. Those that play the game begin to die at their own hands after committing a brutal act of violence. Of those playing, Jake is the only one who seems able to resist the game's coercion, enabling him to investigate what is really going on and discovering it has everything to do with a group of devil worshippers. All of this leading up to the slightly incestuous twist ending. I didn't mind the twist, but it could have been done without the incestuous aspect.

The acting was well-done. For it being his first feature film, Jensen Ackles carries the film well. I felt he did especially well in the scenes of conflict between him and his father, Paul, played by Jensen's real life father, Alan. The two work well together in displaying a strained father/son relationship that, to this fangirl's knowledge, does not exist between them in reality. 

For example, this scene: 

My only fault with Jensen's performance is the Luke Skywalker style "NOOOO!" he lets out at the end of the film upon discovering the last two victims. To someone who has seen this man nail numerous highly emotional scenes since the release of this film, this was a surprising acting choice on his part.

I thought Dominique Swain did a good job portraying the inner conflict of Dakota, a girl who comes off as "easy" but, the movie hints, is dealing with a history of sexual abuse by her father. She made Dakota sexy and silly with a sadness or a void lurking just beneath the surface. She made the character more than just the "token slut" and into someone I could easily care about. I wanted to get to know this character better, but aside from one scene in class, Jake's birthday celebration, the scene at the restaurant where she works, and a slightly hot but mostly awkward sex scene between Dakota and Jake, her character is mostly pushed to the side in favor of far less interesting characters. 

The rest of the performances weren't very noteworthy, even Shannyn Sossamon, who plays Jake's love interest and the closest thing to a leading lady this film has, was rather dull. Did her character, Marisol, and Jake make a cute couple? Yes. But, until the last ten minutes of the film, she's pretty bland. This is not the fault of the actress, the character was written poorly. An actress can only do so much with a bland script.

The characters themselves were pretty flat. Jake is a college student who works as a computer tech and hunts in his spare time. He frequently brings his paralyzed mother orchids at the nursing home, and frequently fights with his apparently ultra-religious father. Oh, and he's been suffering from disturbing visions that he cannot shake off. Still, he's not very interesting, and, truthfully, I probably wouldn't have cared much about him if he was played by a less talented actor.  

As described above, Dakota is by far the most interesting, while Marisol is probably the most boring. Marisol has one quirk, which is her hobby of reading tarot cards. Otherwise she's just a pretty nurse with laptop issues that catches Jake's eye one day and slightly aids him in his quest to solve the mystery of what is happening to his friends.

The one character I didn't really like at all was Conrad, Jake's best friend and, I think, also his cousin (I might be wrong on that one). Conrad is introduced with conflict - Jake has to confiscate a gun from him before he shoots a fellow classmate and that classmate's girlfriend. It is never explained why Conrad hates this classmate, Darius, so much, or why (Slight spoiler) he eventually kills Darius, other than "The Pathway" told him to do it. There is only one scene where Conrad and Jake act like real friends, the rest of the time, Conrad is either attacking Darius or going on about "The Pathway." Also, let's not forget, it's his fault Jake got sucked into the rabbit hole of "The Pathway," in the first place. Conrad, as an overall character, annoyed the hell out of me, and while Jake was devastated to see him go, I was not. 

 Since Conrad's conflict with Darius is never explained, I felt like the scene where he finally kills Darius should have been swapped out with Dakota's final scene.  Her reasons for doing what she does could be considered justified, and her crime is far more interesting in my opinion. Many would argue that the victim had it coming based on his treatment of her from the beginning of the film. The man was a sexual predator and needed to be taken out. However, despite her fully developed storyline, her crime and her death are committed off screen while Conrad's ill-defined storyline gets undeserved attention. 

What is not explained is why the only people that seem to be affected by "The Pathway" are Jake's two closest friends. Then ending explains why they were targeted specifically, as well as the others who meet their end within the film. However, it is stated that this game is popular, so why isn't there anyone else acting strange in town? No one else at Jake's college seems to have  succumbed to this strange behavior, nor any adults or teenagers in the neighborhood. I mean, I know this game is "elite" but you would think at least a few other people in town would have logged on and become fellow players. This plot could have developed into something far bigger, but the disappointing reveal of local devil worshippers being behind the entire thing kept the premise from spreading too far from the small town the film is set in.

The entire time I was watching this film I kept wondering why it was even called, Devour rather than The Pathway, which would have made more sense. I know this was technically answered in a brief, blink-and-you'll-miss-it shot of a plaque in a church depicting a passage from the Bible with the word "devour" in it, but it still doesn't feel fitting to me. "The Pathway" is the initial cause of Jake's problems, and it is mentioned in the film far more than the word "devour," or the Bible verse briefly depicted. 

Overall, this film isn't as terrible as Jensen has been known to claim, but it isn't anything special either. It's a rather tame attempt at a tale of devil worship that mixes aspects of Stay Alive, The Ring, and The Omen into yet another mediocre entry in the horror genre. This is not really worth the watch unless you're a Jensen Ackles fan and want to see some of his work pre-Supernatural. If you are just curious about the sex scene, don't waste your time with the entire movie, Youtube has you covered:

You aren't missing much by skipping this one.

4.5/10

Trailer: