John Dies at the End is a movie that had me at the title. Then I found out it was directed by the same guy (Don Coscarelli) that brought us such indisputable classics as The Beastmaster, and Bubba Ho-Tep. Yes, this movie has cult classic written all over it and rightly so.
Taken from the book of the same name, John Dies at the End - make no mistake - is a weird movie. The lead is Chase Williamson, whose friend just died, but he can communicate with him because he took a drug that is actually alive called "soy sauce." The core storyline is Chase talking to Paul Giamatti (always a pleasure) and trying to tell him what just happened and what is happening.
From there it's a lot of time/alternate reality shifting/monsters-in-the-shadows-that-no-one-can-see plots that seem to go off in lots of directions. The thing with this film is while it never takes itself too seriously, at times it does seem to be trying too hard. Yet at the same time there are some pretty good payoffs from the effort.
In the end, if you ever say, "that movie was weird" in a bad way (I'm looking at you, Mom), then this movie is most certainly not for you. Otherwise, while not worthy of a must-see rating, if you like this sort of thing you will certainly be entertained enough for its 99-minute runtime.
John Dies at the End is now available on DVD (and therefore everywhere online).
