Alicia I love this movie so much

Steineded How sad is this?

Listonixio Fresh and Exciting

InformationRap This is one of the few movies I've ever seen where the whole audience broke into spontaneous, loud applause a third of the way in.

antoniasnyder This is a very good psychological horror adapted from a well-received book. The story concerns two American couple who somehow end up perched on a Mayan pyramid in the middle of nowhere, with the indigenous people waiting for them with bows and arrows on the other side. Also, the pyramid has some evil spirit or something that makes the vines and bushes growing on the pyramid so strange things. The direction is good and the characters are well etched- in fact the first half hour or so is simply buildup. This is a psychological horror and you will be surprised by it.

GL84 Taking a vacation in Mexico, a group of friends arrive at a Mayan temple only to be trapped there by the locals afraid of the vines constantly surrounding the group and must try to find a way out of the situation.This was a highly enjoyable and entertaining affair. One of the better pluses is the fact that there's an incredibly menacing and fearful threat in the film, which are done through the rather creepy vines into a great threat with several really big parts toward them. One of them is that they're literally everywhere in here, covering just about all the surface area possible at the temple and given the reaction that the natives have toward them it makes for a really great threat. Their actions are also worthwhile in making them feared, and those scenes are really well-done here the big with the alive vine wall, which is just utterly creepy and very original as the set-up with the wailing voices coming from the area is nicely handled, the location of being underground in a dank, darkly-lit temple with little to no light provides a ton of atmospherics, and once the twist is revealed about what's actually down there, the whole scene is paid off nicely. The absolute best, though, is the original scene where they find out its powers, snaking out of the shadows to devour and consume fallen parts of a mangled body in front of everybody showing the vines as forces to be reckoned with. This also manages to feature two incredibly brutal scenes that are simply uncomfortable to watch. The first is the leg amputation, which is mainly due to the crudeness of the operation and the visuals and sounds presented make it a really good moment. The other big one where an operation ends up removing vines from several body parts at the same time is also great, as there's the visuals of the vines being removed and wriggling around along with the blood from the wounds, and the endless screaming and brutality make it an extremely uncomfortable scene. That's also the film's other big plus, the blood and gore as this one is quite bloody in its kills and wounds as well as another scene where another victim starts to cut themselves all over the body resulting in a severely bloodied body from head to toe that is quite grotesque-looking. Coupled with a furious pace, this one is a lot of fun since there weren't too many flaws with this one. One of the biggest ones is that there's a distinct inability to have the natives react to the dangers of the vines in completely different ways in similar situations with two key scenes involving characters touching the vines. When one trips and falls into them, despite not knowing what they are, leads the natives into high-pitched yelling and screaming and leading the group up the temple which gives the natives several opportunities to get a shot at killing that one yet nothing occurs. Later, when one of the natives' children merely touches it through absolutely circumstantial means for a shorter amount of time, the child is shot at point blank range without mercy. It's a shocking scene, but flies in the face of their earlier attitude towards the vines. The only other flaw is the failure to explain the history of the vines as there's a crack about animals avoiding it, but nothing else even comes close to explaining them, or what the native's connection with it really is with all the back-stories to this never given and left a mystery. These here are the real flaws to this one.Rated R: Graphic Violence, Graphic Language, Brief Nudity and scene of strong child violence.

Wuchak Scott B. Smith, writer of "A Simple Plan" (the novel and the 1998 movie), also wrote the 2008 novel & film "The Ruins," which is about two college couples vacationing in Mexico who hook up with a German and visit an unknown Mayan pyramid off the beaten track. They are terrorized when local Natives surround the pyramid with deadly weapons, refusing to permit them to leave, and more horrified by the reason why!"The Ruins" refuses to make the mistake of too many conventional horror flicks by not going over-the-top with the situation, the "monster" or the horror/thrills, which makes these films more goofy than horrifying. For instance, take the ending of "The Ruins" (which is different than the book and, in my opinion, better): In a typical horror movie there would've been a wild (i.e. thrilling but totally unbelievable) vehicle pursuit by the Mayan descendants; not here. It's the BELIEVABILITY of "The Ruins" that makes it effective, which is reinforced by the notable acting of the five protagonists.Speaking of which, I don't normally notice acting performances, but I found the acting stellar by the main protagonists – Jonathan Tucker as Jeff, Laura Ramsey as Stacy, Jena Malone as Amy, Shawn Ashmore as Eric and Joe Anderson as Mathias, the German. The two girls and Tucker (Jeff) especially stand out.I found these protagonists likable and fairly fleshed-out for a 90-minute horror flick. For one, they're not the typical frat trash you see in so many horror movies. Secondly, we see signs of character again and again, which I detail below.Some complain that the non-human antagonists are decidedly un-scary, but that's one of the main points of the movie. Like 1963's "The Birds," it takes something we see every day and are NOT scared of and turns them into a source of horror.One memorable scene is when Stacy and Amy are in the dark bowels of the pyramid searching for a cell phone they keep hearing. What they discover is equal parts shocking, surreal and amazing. More on this below. Another memorable sequence is when Jeff & Eric are forced to perform a gruesome operation. The ending is also well-done and suspenseful.While the story takes place on the Yucatán Peninsula, Mexico, it was surprisingly shot at Gold Coast and Tamborine Mountain, Australia, just south of Brisbane, which is on the East coast. In any case, the locations are spectacular.BOTTOM LINE: "The Ruins" really surprised me in light of the inexplicable mediocre ratings and incessant panning. It's an adventure story mixed with psychological horror utilizing something common and un-scary as the "monster." It features quality gore, excellent locations & props, top-of-the-line performances and quality filmmaking in general. Plus it takes advantage of the presence of Laura Ramsey and eschews the overdone cartoony-ness of too many horror flicks, which are more funny than creepy or horrifying. In other words, "The Ruins" delivers the goods.The theatrical version runs 90 minutes and the unrated version 93 minutes. I viewed the latter.GRADE: B+ or A- ***SPOILER ALERT*** (Don't read further unless you've seen the film) The plants that live on the pyramid and what they are able to do spur a fascinating point: The animal kingdom spans the spectrum of worms to human beings. What about plant life? The plants at the Mayan ruins are obviously from the higher-developed end of the plant kingdom – they work as a team to obtain sustenance and are able to mimic sounds, like human voices and the ringtone of a cell phone, etc.I've heard complaints about how the protagonists constantly make the wrong decisions. Answer: The foursome had befriended Mathias and therefore trusted him. They wanted to experience some Mayan history off the beaten track. When the Natives suddenly arrive on the scene and brutally shoot one of their members in the head the only place for them to safely flee is the pyramid. At that point they're stranded because the Natives have the ruins surrounded. How is any of this a wrong decision? Besides, show me a list of the most popular horror flicks and I'll be able to cite way more ridiculous decisions by the protagonists than seen in "The Ruins." Someone complained that the youths never attempt to escape the pyramid until it is basically too late, which supposedly defies logic. Answer: They're only on the pyramid for two nights and were waiting for help to arrive. Their only other recourse was to make a run for the jungle, which was impossible because the pyramid was surrounded by Natives with deadly weapons who already proved they would kill without mercy anyone infected by the plants. As such, the most logical thing to do was to wait for help and only make a run for it (to the jungle) if they absolutely had to, which is what happens. Sounds logical to me.I've heard the criticism that the protagonists are imbeciles with little character development. I found them likable, as noted above, and there are numerous examples of character: They desire to experience the culture of the area and not just utilize their exotic vacation to party, like the average one-dimensional spring-breakers. Also, they refuse to leave Mathias for dead in the pyramid and the girls risk going down the same dubious rope that resulted in his fall. Moreover, Jeff insists on performing the gruesome task of cutting off Mathias' legs and Eric agrees to help even while the primitive operation causes him to vomit. Lastly, Jeff willingly sacrifices himself so that Amy has a chance to escape and she makes a bold dash for freedom. All this sounds like character to me.Needless to say, the criticisms leveled at the film are mostly invalid or easily explained.

spock-billy-spike Not on the same level as the Silence of the Lambs or The Shining, but that's because it isn't a horror psychological thriller, it doesn't have deep meaningful conversations or writing... and it's amazing. The directing is okay, it doesn't try and pass the movie off as some artsy film and pan up from the gore often. It doesn't leave you with questions relating to the duality of man (any Kubrick fans?), but a hell of an adrenaline rush. Well worth the watch, one of the best pure horror movies i've seen. I'd rate it 9/10 for it's genre, but IMDb doesn't work that way. I love meaningful movies, and I love the art in movie making but sometimes you have to sit down for an hour and watch something that gets your heart pumping.