Starring: Leah Pipes, Kristin Cavallari, Josh Henderson, Andrew Lawrence, Lou Diamond Phillips, Sally Kirkland, Geoffrey Lewis, Ginger Gilmartin

Directed By: Harry Basil

Written By: Brian Cleveland, Jason Cleveland

Released: 2006

Grade: B-

Fingerprints is a ghost story that is based on a tragedy that occurred in San Antonio, Texas in 1949. A bus collided in to a train; it stalled while it was on the tracks and was unable to move in time before the train crashed in to it. The bus was full of children. Aside from a few who were able to escape through the windows, it is believed that everyone inside the bus died, although the numbers of those lost were never found. Between 1949 and 1951 people claimed to see ghosts, who were assumed to be those of the children who were killed in the crash. Several of the roads are named with children names and are thought to be those of the victims of the crash. Fingerprints takes this and the many urban legend around it, forming many of its’ own and embellishes from this original accident. It knows it does this and doesn’t bother to try to play it off as a true story to try to make it seem scarier. It just takes a local tale and puts its’ own spin on it to share a more horrific take on the incident with the rest of the world.

Melanie (Pipes) has just gotten out of rehab with some good and not so good memories. She managed to make friends, but her boyfriend ended up overdosing, which caused her a lot of pain. Her father, Doug (Phillips) was moved for work and their family has just moved to a small town in Texas in the San Antonio area. Melanie is very close to her sister, Crystal (Cavallari) and she gets along pretty well with her father, but her mother (Gilmartin) is unbearable to her. Melanie had her problems before, but she is better, yet her mother remains to be critical, strict, and paranoid towards her. People at her new school aren’t very welcoming either. They know about her past and assume the worst out of her. The one person who seems to be different is Penn (Henderson). He lost a brother to a drug overdose and shows a bit more understanding and compassion to Melanie than most people do.

Life in this small town continues to become more and more complicated. Melanie learns of the bus accident that happened. Crystal and others like her friend, Mitch (Lawrence) seem to be big believers in the presence of the children’s ghosts and the legends involved with them. Supposedly if you go to the train tracks where the accident happened and put your car in neutral than your car will move since the children carry you over to the other side. If you put baby powder on the car, their fingerprints will be left there, showing their presence. At first Melanie doesn’t believe this at all. However, she tries it and it works. She begins seeing a young girl who she later finds out was killed in the 1949 accident and her father was the train conductor who was driving the train that night. He was a very respected man in the community. Melanie goes to talk to his other daughter, Mary (Kirkland) to try to find some answers. She ends up just angering Mary by telling her the truth. She continues to be haunted by the ghost of the young girl. She begins to think that this girl is trying to tell her something and is really just desperately pleading for her help. After seeing the conductor’s name in blood, she begins to think there is more to his story than the newspapers led on. When Melanie tells her guidance counselor what she saw, things become more hectic than ever. The chief of police brings her in and accuses her of corrupting or having something to do with the disappearance of his nephew, Mitch, and his girlfriend. Her mother is convinced that she is on drugs and treats her like a prisoner. Melanie is desperate to get out though as she thinks someone has gone after Crystal. Melanie knows more about the truth of what happened than anyone else and she may be the only person who can uncover and reveal the truth before everyone ends up dead, regretting their ignorance of the truth.

The acting was pretty mixed. Majority of the actors didn’t do a very good job. Among the worst is Laguna Beach star, Kristin Cavallari as Crystal. When the horror sunk in she improved a bit, but in the first half of the film, there really was no acting on her part. I almost felt like I was watching Laguna Beach as she gossiped. The only difference is that she focused mostly on stories of this ghost town rather than the elite boys and girls in Orange County. It just seemed that she put no effort into creating accurate expressions or tones. The ending took her out of this gossipy state a little bit, since screaming, shock, and horror took over. Still, if it wasn’t for being on a reality show, I don’t believe she would be getting movie roles, since she doesn’t have the talent for it. Unfortunately, she has several other films coming out this year, which I doubt will challenge her very much and will give us the same character. A lot of the high school kids, Ashley Wyatt in particular wasn’t very good, seeming flat and not giving us much at all. Ginger Gilmartin’s performance felt artificial and forced at times as the truly psychotic mother. She was better than those mentioned above though. When her character was more active, severe, and violent is when she showed a bit more authenticity. With such an intense and crazed character though, I felt she could have given us more.

Luckily, other actors helped pick up the slack to bring a sense of understanding to the characters. Leah Pipes stood out as the best as Melanie. She had a very down to earth feel yet was scarred and is put up against enormous odds, that made us feel for her. It also helped that she was by far the most likeable of all the characters. Josh Henderson had great chemistry with her and seemed to be one of the only worthy guys in the town of her affection. Lou Diamond Phillips seemed like the more believable one and helped balance out both Melanie’s mother’s insanity and the elements of Gilmartin’s performance that was lacking. Andrew Lawrence makes an appearance in the film and is really the spitting image of his older brother, Joseph Lawrence. Although his character is someone who gets no sympathy from us, Lawrence makes his character seem a bit more real. Aside from Pipes, two of the best performances are by Sally Kirkland and Geoffrey Lewis. Kirkland plays Mary and shows a lot of concern, pain, and intensity even if towards the end it has a hint of cheesiness. Geoffrey Lewis played a homeless man who on the outside seemed crazy, but really was just tortured with secrets. Seeing the panic and the build up of this did a lot for the story.

Fingerprints is a much weaker film than some ghost stories like The Orphanage, Stir of Echoes, and The Sixth Sense. Still, compared to the vast majority of them especially of the PG-13 variety, it is much stronger. The story itself, although not perfect, is still pretty decent. It has the ability to capture our interests and from that point on, adds great levels of suspense. There are some major what ifs and although at times they seem like they can withdraw the viewer, at the same time, it makes us wonder and feel the same desperation to know the truth that Melanie is feeling. Also, Fingerprints, while not overdone, still adds more blood and gore than the typical ghost story does. Most use physiological effects rather than visual, yet Fingerprints uses a combination of both of these. The film suffers mostly from some poor performances, unrealistic dialogue, and an abrupt and redundant ending. Even though the actual event it was taken from is fictionalized, the story builds on the crazy situation with visual violence, helping it become a pretty enjoyable film.