One of the better horror films of recent years, is creepy and scary and the sort of thing that makes your skin crawl. Its a simple story- several tourists go to a temple in the Mexican jungle that happens to be off the beaten path. There is of course something there and the locals are not happy about visitors. I won't say more since I'm going tempted to tell you way too much...which would be too much since the plot is simple. Its almost too simple. The reason the film works is that the film has decent characters and it does things that are decidedly not your typical horror movie choices. Its short, its sweet and it works. Its not perfect, there are one or two things I didn't like, but on the whole its a very good very creepy film. Frankly while Brazil got upset about Touristas a year because it might make think people about going there, Mexico should worry since this film will make anyone think again about going into ancient ruins. (7.5 ish out of 10 on the horror scale because thinking about the screams makes my skin crawl)

A surprisingly decent pulp horror outing with its roots (no pun intended) purely in the 1930s: this is based on a contemporary novel which I'm convinced must have been inspired by the Clark Ashton Smith short story The Seed from the Sepulchre (coincidentally one of my favourite stories ever). The story is simple, an age-old tale about naïve teenagers on a holiday from hell, not dissimilar to PARADISE LOST in its own way. Once the characters find themselves trapped in an ancient Mayan temple and at the menace of a most unusual monster it really picks up.

The horror is a neat mix of slow-building fear with graphic surgical gore, a la HOSTEL. It certainly doesn't pull its punches, with one graphic set-piece particularly difficult to forget afterwards. There are plenty of other chilling moments, like the bits involving mimicry or a later scene that literally gets under your skin. The youthful cast is typically dull, with only the German character provoking interest, but that doesn't matter when the story and pacing are so well achieved. It's amazing what a little originality can do: compare this to something like the exceptionally dull PROM NIGHT remake and you'll see what I mean.

Jeff (Jonathan Tucker),Amy (Jena Malone),Stacy (Laura Ramsey),and Eric (Shawn Ashmore) are friends on vacation in a Mexican westernized resort. The two couples are befriended by Mathias (Joe Anderson) who leads the group to a Mayan temple ruins with his friend Dimitri. Mathias' brother Henrich is doing an archaeological dig inside the temple. Mathias uncovers a hidden trail. The group is confronted by Mayan locals. Dimitri is killed while the group escapes up the temple. The Mayans are gathering. The phones don't work and the group has no supplies. A phone is ringing inside the temple. Mathias falls down the shaft into the temple. They discover the locals are actually afraid of the vines growing on the temple.

It's a really slow first third. It's a bunch of young people without much tension. The temple is fine but it's not until the moving vines before it gets truly interesting. The Mayans need to be scarier and they need to be trying to kill the group. That would keep the tension higher. It's a bad sign when the plants are the most interesting aspect of a movie but it does lead to some nice body horror scenes.