I really wanted to like this movie. Witn a description like "about a handsome young soccer player," I understood it was going to be a vehicle to present a half to fully naked Ronen Rubinstein. Got it, no problem, but you can do that and have an engaging storyline. This one forgot that part.

Two of my writing pet peeves were repeatedly exercised throughout this movie. The first, dialog that wanders around and takes 7 or 8 lines of exposition, when a good edit and trust in the actors could have got you there in 2 or 3. Show me someone is depressed, not have three characters tell him he's depressed. The second is when a character reflects back on some really important, life impacting thing that happened in the past, and then goes on to tell the impacted character about it. Generic example: "Remember when your arm fell off that time? You were so scared and in pain. There was blood everywhere, and we had to go to the hospital and have it stitched back on." Pretty sure they'd remember all that, and it's kinda rude to spell out the pain to a friend like that. Again, needed another edit.

Most of the rest was pretty cliche. Bloody gore for bloody gore's sake. Ended exactly the way I thought it would. And to all the gods in B movie heaven, a white panel van? Really?

Actors unchallenged by lazy writing, barely make their way through a movie that could have been edited in half, but doing it on a low budget, brings me to a 4.

Welcome to Boring, California. Population-declining.

We're given a cold opening that tells us that more than 150 young men across the US have drowned under mysterious circumstances. Remember this, it's important. Because, by the US, we mean California.

Well, anyway, we're introduced to our MC. He shows a lot of skin, so I'm just going to call him Skin. Seems every one of Skin's friends is an amateur psychologist and loves to diagnose him. Their most popular diagnosis is "unstable" because actually giving it a name would mean we could nitpick the symptoms. And while I'm no amateur psychologist, to me it seems more like he suffers more from a general malaise than anything else...at least in the beginning. As the movie progresses his status does seem to decline from malaise to depression to outright fugue and dementia/psychosis-like states. But even before that, his friends attempts to help him are very questionable for the amateur psychologists that they are. As many depression sufferers will tell you, being dragged out and manhandled into participating in group events is often detrimental to their mental states. Showing them all the "shiny, happy people" as something they are not-but should be, puts undue pressure on them and often leads to setbacks.

But enough psycho-babble. Skin is being stalked, you see. Strange people follow him around, break into his apartment, mess with his stuff, and leave creepy things laying around for him to find. Of course these bizarre happenings do little for Skin's mental state and start leading him to paranoia and stress. Not that any of his friends care. Nope, he's just having another one of his moments. Naturally, being the pill-popping generation, they encourage him to take his meds. But even when he does, the ongoing interference of his unseen stalkers hampers any improvement. Not that his friends believe him. Nope, just Skin being Skin. It's really beneficial for people that are paranoid to have their worries mocked and ridiculed. Well, things to heck when Skin starts to think his GF is cheating with her ex boyfriend. Of course, still talking to the guy and having him send pictures of them when they were together doesn't help. There's also the fact that the Stalkers are texting Skin strange messages and disturbing images...though he could easily block them...not sure why he doesn't.

So, on and on we go with Skin's issues until finally the movie decides to punch it into gear and the Stalkers make their move. They kidnap Skin...and he makes it oh so hard by standing two feet from the open door of the car that was just running him down minutes earlier. They strip Skin naked and then immediately cover his groin with duct tape. Cause, you know...that's the first thing you do when you take someone's clothes off...cover them back up so you don't get an X-Rating. Of course, had this been a woman and the move were called I Spit on your Grave, I doubt they would have bothered, but we can't have too much skin from "MR." Skin.

So here's where the movie goes wild. Skin manages to escape but the stalkers are in pursuit and go from completely passive to Death Wish levels of carnage. They reacquire Skin, (the Director would like to assure you a really cool scene happened to explain how they did this, they just chose not to film it) kill some bystanders and eventually kill Skin. When asked why...they say its because he's Galiel? Ooooookay. You know, if you're going to bring it up and make it a function of the plot, the least you could do is explain it. So, they toss Skin's corpse in the ocean, paint a smiley face, and move on to their next target. We're given some last minute BS where all of Skin's friends suddenly do a 180 from mostly supporting him to labeling him demented and dangerous. The end.

Analysis: Meh. I really think showing the killer's faces was a misstep. When they were just passive, almost invisible threats, it kept the tension going better. To reveal them...humanizes them. Yes, humans can be crazy killers, but humans can also be stopped. To give them faces and identities kind of ruins the talismanic quality of the unknowable threat. And again, if you're going to give killers a basis for their madness, you should probably explain it. To leave the audience going, "I don't know what that is," isn't a good thing. Also, having the killers go from passive to out-of-control action is jarring. It really begs the question of how they've managed to remain hidden when they cause this much collateral damage. Here's a news flash: Gas stations have cameras. Or did they take the tape/digital recordings with them? Traffic lights also have cameras...I'm pretty sure that guy might have tripped a few in his efforts to escape. Also, there's the question of: How do they manage to kill so many guys when they invest so much time in each one? Remember that cold opening? THIS IS NOT A DROWNING!!! We're not in the 1600's anymore where we can't establish the cause of death. Wanna know a big tip-off about it not being a drowning? There would be no water in his lungs! Know why? He was dead before he went in! You don't breath when you're dead! Not for nothing, but a pathologist would also be able to tell he was exsanguinated as well. And there's little to no chance they're going to mistake all those knife cuts/stab wounds for shark bites. There's also the abrasions that would have been caused by him struggling against the handcuffs...in short, no pathologist anywhere is going to rule this a drowning. And as far as his GF's assertions that he might have killed himself? Suicides rarely strip naked and then duct tape their privates (while their hands are bound) before stabbing themselves in the neck.

Final Thoughts: It's fairly boring. The tension in the beginning form the stalkers (pre-reveal) works okay, but Skin's life is pretty dull. The constant fixation on his mental state is listless and serves no point beyond the interviews at the end. Boy, it's a good thing those stalkers chose a guy like that at complete random, huh? Imagine if they'd chosen a "stable" happy guy? Surely one of those 150 pokem-guys must have been well-balanced. The mental issues "could" have been more viable "if" there were some question whether these things were really happening, or if he was just delusional as his friends claim. But we, as the audience, know the stalkers are real, therefore it's a moot point. The early pacing could have been a lot better. Again, to go from 0 to 100 is pretty jarring and lacks any real build-up that slowly increases the terror. Unless you're a sucker for guy-candy and male objectification I'd recommend avoiding it. It's not the "worst" movie ever, but it's not quite "Run-of-the-mill" either.

Nothing about "River's Edge" director Tim Hunter's serial killer saga "Smiley Face Killers" is funny. Writer & producer Bret Easton Ellis, best known for his nihilistic novel "American Psycho" and the Christian Bale film version, wrote the "Smiley Face Killers" screenplay inspired by the eponymous urban myth. Reportedly, authorities discovered about 150 or more jocks drowned between 1997 and 2010, and their bodies washed up near places near smiley face graffiti symbols. Law enforcement made no arrests, however, because the deaths were ruled accidental. Nevertheless, two retired N.Y.P.D. detectives and a criminal justice professor & gang expert contend serial killers committed these murders. Actually, Ellis penned his script 10 years ago, but it took Hollywood another decade to make it. The unsavory subject matter attracted Ellis because he craves horror movies.

In an interview, Ellis said, "Something about the aesthetic - young, handsome, athletic men who are in college are suddenly drowning, or people haven't noticed that they're suddenly drowning, along the western seaboard of the California coast. I wanted to do a variation on the myth. I didn't want to do the myth itself because no one knows what happened or if it's even true. But, the idea of it and making it more of a horror film, and gorier and having a number of kills in it spoke to me."

If you think "Smiley Face Killers" amounts to just another standard-issue slasher saga, prepare yourself for a rude surprise. The first two-thirds of this chiller foreshadow the ghastly final third. Initially, it unfolds as a soap opera about a depressed twentysomething athlete who fears his girlfriend may dump him for her ex-boyfriend. Meanwhile, bizarre text messages spam our protagonist's phone with allusions to strange aquatic gods. During the last thirty minutes, horror erupts in a crescendo of blood, violence and gore galore. The phantom-like villains are the sketchiest part of this literate nail-biter.

Hunky young stud Jake Graham (Ronen Rubinstein of "No Escape") plays on the university soccer team. He cycles everywhere on his bike, but he suffers from bouts of depression. His relationship with his girlfriend Keren (Mia Serafino of "Zeroville") becomes complicated, and he ignores her pleas to resume his meds. Gradually, Jake obsesses over his paranoia and accuses Keren's ex-boyfriend Rob (newcomer Cody Simpson) of tampering with his laptop. Little does Jake realize that two stealthy stalkers in a pale white Ford Econoline van have been conducting 24/7 surveillance on him. They're circling him as their next prey. They tail Jake around town and lurk on the periphery without attracting his attention. Eventually, they sneak into the rental house Jake splits with an older doctoral student. The bewildered grad student suspects Jake has gone gaga. He finds water standing in all the sinks and bathtubs. No sooner has he drained them than he finds these receptacles replenished! When he least expects a prowler, one surprises him and caves in his skull with a hammer. Ironically, blinded by his own woes, Jake never noticed droplets of his roommate's blood on the hallway floor.

Finally, these creepy cultists cruise up in their van alongside Jake on a desolate street after dark. Shuttling the side panel door open, they surprise our protagonist and haul him into the van. Later, Jake manages to escape and sprints around virtually naked until he spots a neon-bright, self-service gas station. The owner, who hates college kids and their pranks, refuses to heed Jake's warnings. A hooded man marches inside and shoots the owner without a blink and then strikes Jake unconscious with his gun. While this hood carries Jake's inert body on his shoulder back to the van, a Mercedes sedan with four college kids pulls in for gas. They find the blood-splattered owner but fare no better. The hooded felon brandishes a hatchet and slaughters the stunned passengers. By the time the driver careens out of the gas station, he is driving a hearse. Soon, the white Ford van forces him off the road. The driver struggles futilely to crank his stalled Mercedes. Quietly, a hooded gunman approaches him. The whimpering driver begs for mercy but gets a bullet.

Director Tim Hunter's approach to the subject matter is subtle and sophisticated. He stages Jake's torture in the van and the murders with straightforward but chilling detachment. Basically, horror movies are action & adventure epics turned upside down, with macabre endings that reward evil.

During the first hour of "Smiley Face Killers," Hunter orchestrates everything so that an inconspicuous Ford appears in each scene without Jake paying any attention to it. Later, when he showers, these cloaked intruders enter Jake's house and plant an incriminating California map on his bed with smiley face emblems along the coast. The map baffles Jake. Police remind us always to be vigilant. Sadly, our protagonist is so preoccupied with his own paranoia about Keren and Rob that he doesn't realize he is being groomed for the grave.

Clever as these cloaked miscreants are, they remain hopelessly enigmatic in their dark ominous robes. Indeed, we catch only glimpses of actor Crispin Glover in scar-tissue make-up. Hunter and Ellis deprive them of any motives. We never see them when they aren't stalking their prey. We're allowed to marvel at their stealth and secrecy, but we never learn what fuels their white-on-white crime. Instead, the filmmakers stun us with flashes of shocking violence, while we hope their victims will escape and expose them. Unfortunately, poor Jake has isolated himself so utterly from Keren and his soccer teammates that they cannot help him. Although he starts back on his meds, he doesn't do it soon enough to make a difference.

Scenarist Bret Easton Ellis has shifted the murders from the Midwest to California. Instead of dumping bodies in rivers and lakes, these killers abandon them on the beaches. As the film closes, these wicked wrongdoers have spotted their next brawny jock. "Smiley Face Killers" leaves us with little to laugh about but something to dread.