Justin Dec

Warning: although the movie is light on sexual violence, there's a moment when one of the doctors tries to kiss Quinn against her will.

Quinn, a young nurse, downloads an app called Countdown that a patient told her about. It supposedly tells you when you're going to die, and her patient swears it killed his girlfriend and will soon kill him as well. After her patient skips his upcoming surgery only to die in a hospital stairwell, Quinn begins to worry that what he told her about the app is real. As her countdown approaches zero, she sees and experiences terrifying things. Can she figure out how to break free from the app's grip before it manages to kill her too?

I wanted horror that wasn't too gory, and that's what I got. Countdown wasn't a great movie, and the average horror fan likely won't think it's scary enough, but it was perfect for my evening.

I, the horror movie wimp, don't recall a single moment that tempted me to hide my eyes. There were a few bloody scenes, and I recall a few jump scares, but the movie didn't linger on anything too awful. The grossest moments involved a corpse's eyes and some feet that bent in a way feet should not, but both were pretty brief.

I can't imagine downloading an app just to see a countdown to the moment when I'm supposedly going to die, but the movie did its best to make it seem relatively plausible that so many people would do it. The first bunch were probably at least a little drunk, and the others were fixated on the deaths of people they cared about and were therefore inclined to be more morbidly curious about death. I found it less believable that apparently only a couple people would try to delete the app after downloading it.

The movie didn't take itself completely seriously, which was probably a good thing. A couple characters basically only existed only as convenient ways to keep the story moving forward at the necessary pace, so the writers had a bit of fun with them. There was Father John, who became a priest entirely because he thought the idea of fighting demons was cool, and Derek the tech store manager, who didn't believe in evil apps.

The solution to the whole thing was somewhat clever, although marred by a cliched "but are they really safe now?" ending. Will I ever rewatch this? No, but it was decent enough entertainment for an evening.

(Original review posted on A Library Girl's Familiar Diversions.)… (meer)