For some strange reason I always had a crush on Daphne Zuniga growing up. Of all the actresses out there, I thought she was especially beautiful and I can't even remember how many times I watched Gross Anatomy(although I do recall being rather disappointed that it wasn't all that gross). But, The Initiation was a flick I'd never been able to watch because none of the local video shops carried a copy. So, last year when I saw it for sale on the net I quickly snatched it up with high hopes. Was I expecting too much? Apparently.

The flick begins promisingly as a young girl catches her mama in bed with a man. When another man comes into the room a scuffle breaks out and one of them ends up on fire. Now that's the way to start a horror movie! From there we see Daphne Zuniga all grown up and trying to get into a sorority. For some reason I always though sorority girls wore a lot less clothing than they do in this movie. Oh well... But anyway, the story takes a while to really get rolling. We see Daphne have nightmares, we see Daphne get hypnotized(repressed memories anyone?), we see Daphne falling for a professor, etc. Somewhere along the line a crazy burned man breaks out of the nuthouse and people start dying badly. We get hear some talk about spending the night in a mall but it doesn't happen until nearly the end. And actually, not a whole lot of anything happens until nearly the end when lots of people die and we get blindsided by a cheesy plot twist.

My biggest complaint against the flick is that nothing really interesting is happening in about 80% of the scenes. The 20% where something is going on are actually pretty damn good and show what a fun movie this could have been. The gore is very nice but not abundant. For the flesh fiends out there, we see several pledges walking into and out of the shower - there's even some full frontal. Alas, Daphne stayed clothed, but she does tease us in one scene. The acting is also below average, everyone seems to sleepwalk through their roles. Maybe it's because the writer was asleep at the wheel as well. Unfortunately, The Initiation makes the biggest mistake a horror movie can make in my opinion - it's dull.