Catacombs (DVD)

When you pop in a DVD and you hear an opening voiceover from the likes of Humphrey Bogart (The Maltese Falcon), Joan Fontaine (Rebecca), or Tommy Lee Jones (No Country for Old Men), you know it’s going to be good. But when it starts off with Shannyn Sossamon? Well… not so much. Not that we have the likes of John Houston or the Coen Brothers sitting in the director’s chair, either; Catacombs, starring the aforementioned cutie pie and directed by relative newcomers Tomm Coker and David Elliot, is a decent spook-n-scare chase film, and nothing more. Which is fine, as long as you figure that going in.

Sossamon plays Victoria, a mousy but pretty young American who receives a postcard from her much more adventurous sister Carolyn (Alecia "Pink" Moore), who’s living the life in Paris, France. The postcard simply says to come and visit, so Victoria decides to drop everything and board a jet. She hopes it will cure her strong reticence to, well… everything. Victoria is one of those nervous nellys who is a psychiatrist’s dream: she’s afraid of the dark, afraid of traveling, afraid of her own shadow, and yet not afraid to spend money on therapy and several medications.

Soon enough, Victoria is in Gay Paree, in a taxi, and at her sister’s flat, which the brash blonde shares with several snarky gadabouts. Before you can say bonjour, they’ve talked the bashful brunet into going to a secret rave in the city’s ancient underground catacombs, and the freaky fun begins.

If you can suspend disbelief and buy into the fact that hundreds of ecstasy-bolstered teens, a loud DJ, and boisterous bartenders can “hide” in one of the most famed European tourist attractions undetected (apparently, this rave is one of many that are a regular part of Carolyn and co.’s nightly M.O.), then Catacombs is a relatively above-par direct-to-disk boo-fest.

It’s got an atmospheric location (it’s a nice change from the old haunted house or hospital standby), the sets are appropriately spooky (dark but inscrutable, scattered skeletons), and Sossamon can really holler. In spite of the fact this flick does mostly consist of sprinting and screaming, the suspense is nicely cranked throughout. Fortunately, there is a very little dialogue, because what there is of it, is pretty lame.

Just when things start to get a bit too monotonous, Victoria encounters a fellow lost soul (a non-English speaking Frenchman, which leads to some silly miming and charades but at least it’s human interaction after much solo stumbling in the dark) and they play off each other for awhile until one of them suffers a grisly fate (guess which one?). Between the brackets, there’s not an awfully high body count, but given the limitations of the script, the tension is kept to a reasonably high level.

Well, mostly: The simple story does run out of steam towards the end and the “surprise” ending really isn’t. Still, it’s worth a look if you’ve tolerated trapped-in-peril movies like The Cave or Creep, then Catacombs is a definite step up.

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Reviewed by Staci Layne Wilson