Sands Of Oblivion (Anchor Bay)

 

Picture: C+     Sound: B-     Extras: C-     Telefilm: C-

 

 

One of the wackier ideas for a telefilm, Kevin VanHook is back and his new Horror genre offering Sands Of Oblivion (2007) tells us the story of how Cecil B. DeMille burned down his Ten Commandments sets when he made the silent version (from the 1920s) for unknown reasons, until a group of people return and unearth something haunting the area.  Now, some of them may die finding out.

 

Unfortunately, I was dying of boredom despite the interesting concept and despite a better than usual cast including Adam Baldwin, Morena Baccarin, Victor Webster, Dan Castellaneta, Richard Kind and even George Kennedy, the film never takes off and even the idea gets lost in the same old routine plotting.  VanHook has even done better, but this never pans out.

 

The anamorphically enhanced 1.78 X 1 image is soft throughout, looks like it was shot on video and is loaded with motion blur throughout.  The Dolby Digital 5.1 mix is not as bad as expected, though obviously not created to utilize multi-channel and still has its weak points.  A Dolby 2.0 Stereo option is also included, though it is weaker.  The only extra is a making of featurette.

 

 

-   Nicholas Sheffo