Day 287: The Ruins

The Ruins is one of those b horror movies that mostly take place in one setting. Not sure where or how I originally saw this unless it was purely for my Jena Malone crush.

The Ruins follows two couples who are on vacation in South America and befriend a German whose brother has gone missing. The couples and another buddy go with the German to a set of old Mayan ruins to look for the missing brother. After a hostile reception from the local Mayan population (who murder one of the party), the remaining five flee to the top of the ruins where the locals will not follow. Our group quickly learns that the locals are afraid of the vines growing all over the ruins. Once someone touches them, they are as good as dead to the Mayans. The rest of the movie is the five protagonists on top of the ruins trying to ward off sinister vine attacks.

Shawn Ashmore and Jena Malone do a fairly good job here as two of the yahoos stuck on this temple. There are incursions into the center of the temple and various attempts to deal with the Mayans surrounding them. This is one of those b movies where you could probably predict every beat as the vines start working their way into people's bodies. It plays a little like a more exotic version of Splinter.

This isn't going to win any awards or anything but it is a decent enough afternoon horror movie. Everything is very competently done and should work as a 90 minute entertainment.