The Graves

Ghost towns don't normally have a live show that has the blacksmith crush the patrons with his hammer, but this ain't no normal attraction.

 

The "Graves" part of the movie title is in reference to Megan and Abby Graves.  Sisters who are on a mission to see the world's largest thermometer.  They are about 50 miles off track and end up in the town of Unity, AZ.  Unity doesn't have the attraction that they were looking for, but it does have Skull City.  An abandoned town from the gold mining days.

 

The girls don't pass up the chance to visit.  BEAVIS AND BUTTHEAD ALERT: conversation between the sisters, "What's that?", "The entrance to the mine shaft", "You said shaft".  They have a run in with the blacksmith and do something that no one else has been able to do, kill the blacksmith.  Not the best kill scene and it also forces the movie to last longer.

 

They think that they are out of danger now and flag down a passing truck on the highway.  They confess to killing the blacksmith (in self defense) to the driver, only they didn't know that the driver is the brother of the blacksmith.  Now the brother is going after the sisters.

 

The movie continues on and throws in a bit of crazy religious fanaticism into the mix.  Apparently the town has been smelling some gas from the mine that makes you want to thrash anyone in your path and they are blaming it on Satan.  And to help purify the town, they kill any new comers as a command from a higher power.

 

No quality death scenes and way too much of the seizure cam.  You know.  When someone is running away from something and they need to bob the camera up and down so that you are looking at a person's feet and the sky within two frames.  Let alone the "I'm not a main character, so it must be my turn to die" people that conveniently arrive.

 

I give this movie 1/2 out of 5 Skull City mines.