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List Price: $19.98 | | Label: Live / Artisan
Salesrank: 164227
Released: October 22, 2002 |
| Our Price: $17.98 |
| Used Price: $17.95 |
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MPAA Rating: R (Restricted)
Media: DVD |
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Editorial Review:
Studio: Lions Gate Home Ent. Release Date: 05/13/2008
Description of Soul Survivors/Jacob's Ladder:
Soul Survivors
Think of Soul Survivors as a more sincere version of A Nightmare on Elm Street. The night before Cassie (the Gwynethesque Melissa Sagemiller) starts college, she gets into a terrifying car accident with her boyfriend (Casey Affleck) and best friends (Wes Bentley from American Beauty and Eliza Dushku from Bring It On and Buffy the Vampire Slayer). But was it an accident? And who survived? Cassie starts college--but she also keeps hallucinating about frightening men she saw at a party prior to the accident, as well as about undergoing surgery after it. Is college itself the hallucination? These slips from one reality to the next build an increasing sense of discomfort and anxiety--though some viewers may be made more anxious by a scene in which Sagemiller and Dushku step into a shower together. Or do they... --Bret Fetzer
Jacob's Ladder
Vietnam veteran Jacob Singer (Tim Robbins) thinks he is going insane. Or worse. When his nightmares begin spilling into his waking hours, Jacob believes he is experiencing the aftereffects of a powerful drug tested on him during Vietnam. Or perhaps his posttraumatic stress disorder is worse than most. Whatever is happening to him, it is not good. Director Adrian Lyne sparks our interest and maintains high production values, but this confusing film chokes on its "surprise" ending. It owes much to Ambrose Bierce's haunting and more straightforward story, "An Occurrence at Owl Creek." Written by Bruce Joel Rubin, who also explored the "other side" in Ghost and My Life, it ultimately feels like an exercise in self-indulgence. A spirited performance by Elizabeth Peña outshines Robbins, who is surprisingly lethargic. --Rochelle O'Gorman
Soul Survivors/Jacob's Ladder Reviews:
Double-feature *SPOILERS* 
2009-09-16 - JACOB'S LADDER (1990) has the exact plot device that's used in CARNIVAL OF SOULS (1962), THE SIXTH SENSE (1999), DONNIE DARKO (2001) and perhaps other films:
Within a few minutes of the beginning, something definitive happens to the main character that absolutely dictates the story's conclusion. All that comes between these points is either explanatory of this crucial moment or an attempt to distract the viewer. This unfortunate will see demons, ghosts or other weird phenomena, experience hallucinations, bounce between lives, have flashbacks and generally be in distress.
What separates JACOB'S LADDER from the rest is that on more than one occasion, Jake is subtly or blatantly told that HE IS DEAD. In spite of these revelations, Jake continues to stagger through the last moments of a life that will end on a Vietnam M.A.S.H unit operating table.
SOUL SURVIVORS uses the cheapest of deus ex macinae: this girl who gets in a car wreck that kills her boyfriend has freakish, unexplainable stuff happen to her (like seeing the BF's ghost) and in the end she wakes up in the hospital after battling a brain injury and her boyfriend isn't dead after all. feh!
Well, at least half this double-feature is worth watching!
boo to double packs that serve only to deplete unwanted inventory
2005-07-15 - i really thought i was getting a deal when i bought ANY movie with jacob's ladder. boy, was i ever wrong. first off, jacob's ladder is one of my favorite movies. i've been watching this movie since i was a little girl, back when the highlight of the film was mooning over my crush, macauley culkin. i remember many late nights at slumber parties after playing "light as a feather, stiff as a board" spent watching this movie.
ahhh, memories...
anyway, let's crack the whip and tear into "soul survivors." this movie is a steaming tUrd (notice that i spell that with a capital U because it looks like a toilet bowl, and that's where this movie belongs.)
alright, so now i sound like the crazy one, but trust me, you'll be tearing your eyes out in mourning over the downward trajectory that cinema has taken in recent years. this movie embodies all of the worst things about movies today - painfully terrible dialogue (the kind where you'd feel bad for the actor, but they're just as bad), stupefyingly vapid delivery (here's lookin' at you, eliza dushku), plot holes bigger than my ever-expanding backside (and that's sayin' something), less atmosphere and tone than a mcdonald's in montana, etc, etc, ad infinitum.
save yourself the embarrassment of having this stinker on your dvd rack - buy jacob's ladder by itself and try your hardest to forget that you ever heard of soul survivors.
