The biggest problem with "The Skulls" is that it's un-memorable. It isn't terrible but doesn't offer any surprises or thrills either. Basically it's about a three best friends (Joshua Jackson as Luke, Leslie Bibb as Chloe and Hill Harper as Will) who attend college together. Everything is fine and dandy until Luke gets invited to join a secret society on campus known as The Skulls. He makes new friends (most prominently Paul Walker as Caleb) and doesn't want anything to do with his old ones and if that wasn't bad enough, the secret society turns out to be pretty sinister.
The plot starts off promising, with Joshua Jackson and Paul Walker's characters bonding (due to their new connection in the Skulls) coming in and disturbing the friendship that is set up between the likable characters in the introduction. From then on the film doesn't really take any chances and goes for the easy route, with standard evil secret society stuff, a predictable murder mystery and a shoehorned love story. Some of the plot points are ridiculous and contrived; like vaults of incriminating security tapes (despite a clearly corrupt leadership that readily disposes of damning evidence), a plot to send a whistle blower to an insane asylum (instead of simply killing him when we've seen that the Skulls have no qualms about killing people) and a problem that in the 21st century could easily be solved in a few minutes (using news media or the internet). For younger, less discriminating audiences this might be entertaining but if you've ever seen any movie with a secret society or cult, you've seen this film before and probably better. (On DVD, November 18, 2012)
The plot starts off promising, with Joshua Jackson and Paul Walker's characters bonding (due to their new connection in the Skulls) coming in and disturbing the friendship that is set up between the likable characters in the introduction. From then on the film doesn't really take any chances and goes for the easy route, with standard evil secret society stuff, a predictable murder mystery and a shoehorned love story. Some of the plot points are ridiculous and contrived; like vaults of incriminating security tapes (despite a clearly corrupt leadership that readily disposes of damning evidence), a plot to send a whistle blower to an insane asylum (instead of simply killing him when we've seen that the Skulls have no qualms about killing people) and a problem that in the 21st century could easily be solved in a few minutes (using news media or the internet). For younger, less discriminating audiences this might be entertaining but if you've ever seen any movie with a secret society or cult, you've seen this film before and probably better. (On DVD, November 18, 2012)
