The Lazarus Effect

MPAA Rating: PG-13 for intense sequences of horror violence, terror and some sexual references.
Run Time: 83 Minutes
My Rating: 3/5
So last night, I went and saw Relativity Studios' and Blumhouse Productions' The Lazarus Effect starring Olivia Wilde (Fox's House M.D.), Sarah Bolger (ABC's Once Upon A Time), Donald Glover (NBC's Community), and Evan Peters (FX's American Horror Story).  The film follows a group of medical students who begin experimenting on bringing dead animals back from the dead.  However, one of their experiments goes horribly wrong and causes the death of one their own.  Filled with immense sadness, terror, and disbelief, the team does the unthinkable and attempts to resurrect their first human subject.  At first everything seems to be normal, but as time goes on the group realizes that something is terribly wrong with their friend.  Now as their friend's new persona begins to reveal itself, they realize that they may have awoken their worst nightmare.
So personally, I thought the film was good, but I thought it could have been better.  I think the idea is very intriguing and definitely something that would make for an excellent horror film.  However, I just feel like the film had too many faults that stopped it from fully achieving its potential.  Probably one of my biggest problems was that I thought the film was way to short.  With less than an hour and a half running time and over half of the film being used for setting up the premise, when it finally got to the horror part of the show, there was less than 20 minutes left. So that resulted in a rushed conclusion which I feel needed to be slow-down for more suspense. Instead the filmmakers relied upon too many minor scares during the first part of the film, then the potential true horrors that the ending could have provided.  I have to admit that I was a little bugged walking out of the theater because I felt like there was so much more to the story that the filmmakers just left out or ignored.  I had so many questions at the end of the movie that I wanted answered, which unfortunately I probably never will have answered.
Though I thought that there were many problems with the film, there were still great things about it. Like I said above, I truly thought that the idea and story was very intriguing, I just thought that the film ended way too soon.  Also probably the best thing about this film is its relatively young and unknown cast.  All of them I thought provided excellent performances, but probably the true standout was Olivia Wilde as the friend who get resurrected.  She gives an absolutely amazing performance and one that will truly haunt your nightmares days after watching this film.  She plays this character with so much passion and is truly terrifying.
Overall, I thought the film was good, but not great.  If you are a horror fan I would recommend you go and see this film.  It may not be the greatest horror film you will ever see, but the cast, especially Olivia Wilde, definitely makes up for it.  I would most likely watch this film again, just for their performances.  The film doesn't do anything new with the genre, but it still provides a great sense of terror.