My Bloody Valentine 3D


My Bloody Valentine 3D is a 2009 American slasher film directed and co-edited by Patrick Lussier, and starring Jensen Ackles, Jaime King, Kerr Smith, and Kevin Tighe. It is a remake of the 1981 Canadian slasher film of the same name. The film focuses on the residents of a small town that is plagued by a serial killer in mining gear on Valentine's Day.
After filming on location in Pennsylvania, the film was given a 3D theatrical release in the United States by Lionsgate. It was the first R-rated film to be projected in RealD technology and to have a wide release in 3D-enabled theaters.
My Bloody Valentine 3D was released on January 16, 2009, and grossed $100.7 million worldwide on a budget of $14 million. It received mixed-to-positive reviews from film critics.

Plot

On Valentine's Day 1997, the small mining community of Harmony is rocked by an explosion at the Hanniger mine. Comatose Harry Warden is the sole survivor, after killing five fellow miners to conserve his own oxygen. Tom Hanniger, son of the mine's owner, is blamed for the explosion.
One year later, Warden awakens from his coma and murders numerous patients and staff, leaving a victim’s heart in a box of chocolates. While Tom, his girlfriend Sarah, and other teenagers party inside the mine, Warden – wearing mining gear and a gas mask – attacks them with a pickaxe. Sarah, Axel, and Irene flee, and Warden is shot by Sheriff Burke before he can kill Tom, but escapes into the mine.
Ten years later, Tom is called back to Harmony after his father dies. He plans to sell the mine, against the advice of local politician Ben Foley. Axel, now the town’s sheriff, has married Sarah but is having an affair with her coworker Megan. They have sex at Axel’s cabin, where Megan gives him a Valentine’s gift.
At the motel where Tom is staying, Irene is having energetic sex with a local trucker named Frank. She becomes enraged when she finds out that he has secretly filmed them having sex. Frank asks her if she wants money to keep her quiet. Irene confronts Frank and tells him that she is not a hooker. Frank laughs and flips money at her and says that she is one tonight. A completely naked Irene grabs a gun and confronts Frank in the parking lot, where Frank tells her to put some clothes on and that he does not want her anymore. Angry and disgusted Irene throws the gun at Frank and hits him between the eyes. Suddenly a masked assailant in mining gear kills Frank with a pickaxe by slamming it down on his head. Now defenseless without the gun Irene stares in terror at the killer as Frank's camera lay on the ground recording it. Irene turns and flees to her room and hides under the bed, as the Miner kills a hotel clerk. The miner rips the mattress from atop the bed and Irene uses the metal frame to protect herself before the Miner finally drives the pickaxe through her bare abdomen.
Investigating the scene, Axel discovers Irene’s heart is missing, and Frank’s camera footage reveals the Miner, furthering rumors that Warden has returned. Axel, jealous that Tom is back in Sarah’s life, receives a heart-shaped box containing Irene’s heart. His suspicions turn to Tom, who is rescued from a bar fight by the now-retired Burke. Touring the mine, Tom is locked inside a utility cage by the Miner who then murders another miner who had been accompanying Tom and disappears as others arrive. Axel reveals that ten years before, Foley and Burke found Warden after his attack and killed him, but his grave in the woods is now empty.
That night, Tom returns to the mine and finds Axel’s cabin nearby. The Miner kills Foley and leaves his body in Warden’s grave; realizing the killer must be one of the few people aware of the grave, Axel sends a deputy to guard his house. The Miner attacks Sarah and Megan at the grocery store, dragging Megan away. Axel arrives, and he and Sarah find Megan dead, with the message “Be Mine 4 Ever” scrawled in her blood and her heart in a box of chocolates.
At the Palmers’ house, the Miner kills their housekeeper. Deputy Ferris finds Sarah’s son Noah safe inside, but the Miner kills Burke. As Tom drives Sarah to Axel’s cabin, Axel calls her and explains that Tom is the killer, having spent the last seven years in a mental institution. Tom claims that Axel is the real killer, but Sarah crashes the car and escapes into the woods. She calls Axel, who tells her to hide at his cabin, where she discovers a card from Megan – “Be Mine 4 Ever” – and a closet full of heart-shaped boxes. Convinced Axel is the killer, Sarah is attacked by the Miner, who chases her into the mine.
She runs into Axel, seizing his gun, and Tom arrives. Sarah holds them both at gunpoint as they protest their innocence, until Tom’s knowledge of Megan’s death inadvertently reveals he is the killer. The disturbed Tom has a hallucination, revealing the Miner is his split personality – after returning to Harmony, he dug up Warden’s mining gear and carried out the killings, framing Axel.
After a struggle, Tom wounds Axel, and Sarah shoots Tom; the bullet passes through his side and strikes a fuel tank, igniting an explosion. Sarah and Axel are rescued from the resulting cave-in, and Axel declares Tom is dead. Tom, however, murders the rescue worker who finds him and escapes.

Cast

The film was shot in South Western Pennsylvania, taking advantage of the state's tax incentives for film productions as well as the topographical and architectural versatility of the Pittsburgh Metro area. Filming began on May 11, 2008 in Armstrong County along the Route 28 corridor, in locations including Sprankle's Market in Kittanning, the Ford City police station, and the exterior of the Logansport Mine in Bethel. Kittanning served as the main street in the film's fictional town of Harmony. The production spent 13 days filming scenes in the Tour-Ed Mines in the Pittsburgh suburb of Tarentum, a mine that has been out of production since the 1960s and now operates as a museum. The inside of Valliant's Diner in Ross Township was used as a location for one scene, and a house on Hulton Road in Oakmont, a suburb of Pittsburgh, was also used as a location.
The film was shot entirely digitally in 4K resolution. The filmmakers used the Red One from Red Digital Cinema Camera Company, and the SI-2K Digital Cinema Camera by Silicon Imaging as digital cameras. Max Penner, the film's stereographer, found these lighter and smaller cameras easier to use. My Bloody Valentine was the first R-rated film to be projected in RealD technology and to have a wide release in 3D-enabled theaters. The film was also available in 2D for theaters that were not equipped to process digital 3D technology.
Special make-up effects were created by Gary J. Tunnicliffe.

Release

On its 4-day opening weekend, the film grossed $24.1 million, ranking #3 for the weekend, behind Gran Torino at #2, and at #1. In its second weekend, the movie grossed estimated $10.1 million, ranking number 6 at the domestic box office. The film grossed $51,545,952 in the United States and Canada, and $49,188,766 in other markets for a worldwide total of $100,734,718.

Critical response

Review aggregator website Rotten Tomatoes reports that 62% of 106 critics gave the film a positive review, with the consensus reading: "This gory, senses-assaulting slasher film is an unpretentious, effective mix of old-school horror stylings and modern 3D technology." On Metacritic, which assigns a weighted average score out of 100 to reviews from mainstream critics, the film received an average score of 51 based on 11 reviews.
Joe Leydon of Variety said, "director and co-editor Lussier plays the 3-D gimmick for all it's worth: Everything from tree branches and gun barrels to bloody pickaxes and bloodier body parts appears to jump off the screen. He also makes effective use of the depth-of-field illusion, allowing audiences long views of various chest cavities from which hearts have been rudely ripped. At the very least, the overall tech package is a great deal more impactful than that of the 3-D-lensed Friday the 13th Part III ". He added, in spite of the "state-of-the-art 3-D camera trickery, which helmer Patrick Lussier shamelessly exploits to goose the audience with cheap thrills and full-bore gore, My Bloody Valentine is at heart an unabashedly retro work, reveling in the cliches and conventions of the slasher horror pics that proliferated in the early 1980s".
Mark Olsen of the Los Angeles Times said, the implemented 3-D technology enables "startling effects, but after a while the minor thrill of the trick is gone. Advances in digital technology have allowed the filmmakers to largely avoid the physical headaches that are perhaps the biggest hallmark of the cyclical attempts at 3-D moviemaking". He added, "wooden performances by forgettable, generic actors -- again, just like in the original -- don't aid in making things any less leaden", concluding My Bloody Valentine 3D is "just good enough to not be annoying".
Jeannette Catsoulis of The New York Times said, "the creaky screenplay is mercilessly at odds with the director's fine sense of pacing. From the moment you duck a flying mandible and gaze, mesmerized, at a severed hand oozing two inches from your nose, you'll be convinced that the extra dimension was worth seeking out. A strange synergy of old and new, My Bloody Valentine 3D blends cutting-edge technology and old-school prosthetics to produce something both familiar and alien: gore you can believe in".
Clark Collis of Entertainment Weekly graded the film a C+ and said that it "starts in spectacular fashion. But what really leaps out at you about My Bloody Valentine 3-D is its lack of imagination". Frank Scheck of The Hollywood Reporter felt, "While the concept of adding 3-D to the horror genre is hardly new... Patrick Lussier's film is the most accomplished example. The 3-D effects come fast and furious, rendered with a technical skill and humor that gives this otherwise strictly formulaic slasher picture whatever entertainment value it possesses." He added, "the three leads actually manage to invest their roles with some depth, but the real acting treats come courtesy of veteran character actors Kevin Tighe and Atkins, whose presence provides a comforting bridge to horror films past."

Home media

My Bloody Valentine 3D was released on DVD and Blu-ray on May 19, 2009 and has grossed in excess of $19.7 million, with DVD sales and theater gross revenue totaling over $119.9 million.
Both home release versions have both a standard 2D version and the 3D version on the same disc using seamless branching.
On October 5, 2010, Lionsgate Home Entertainment released My Bloody Valentine 3D on Blu-ray 3D which requires a 3D-capable HDTV, 3D Blu-ray player and 3D glasses. The disc also includes a 2D version of the film and all bonus materials included in the 2D Blu-ray version released after the film's initial theater run.