Chernobyl Diaries
A group of six young vacationers look to go off the beaten path, hire an 'extreme' tour guide. Ignoring warnings, he takes them into the city of Pripyat, the former home to the workers of the Chernobyl nuclear reactor, but a deserted town since the disaster more than 25 years ago. After a brief exploration of the abandoned city, however, the group soon finds themselves stranded, only to discover that they are not alone...
23 November 1979, Chicago, Illinois, USA
16 February 1967, Moscow, RSFSR, USSR [now Russia]
28 December 1981, Cacak, Serbia, Yugoslavia
4 November 1985, San Luis Obispo, California, USA
9 April 1987, New York City, New York, USA
11 April 1968, Alameda County, California, USA
1980, Sunbury, Victoria, Australia
18 January 1986, St. Paul, Minnesota, USA
August 26, 2015
For all its familiar ideas, characters, and scares, Chernobyl Diaries earns points on restraint, mood, and location.
February 15, 2013
After one effective scene involving a radiated Russian bear, the quality of first-time director Bradley Parker's narrative starts melting down like a TEPCO facility.
May 28, 2012
The real stars of the movie are the tired devices and plot points. They're famous, but they're as old as Betty White: The Guide Is Dead, The Van Won't Start, Her Shirt Has a Plunging Neckline, Don't Go in There.
October 21, 2012
Its strengths make it worth paying attention to, while its weaknesses prevent it from becoming the first-class chiller it had the potential to be.
May 25, 2012
You might actively root for their collective demise, if you could rouse yourself to care one way or the other. Go gallivanting in Chernobyl and you get what you pay for, nimrods.
May 29, 2012
Director Bradley Parker shakes his camera around a lot.
May 25, 2012
First-time director Bradley Parker (working from a script co-written by Paranormal Activity creator Oren Peli) understands that suggesting is scarier than showing, and confusion generates more suspense than explanations do.
May 25, 2012
Standard-issue genre accessories (dank stairways, flashlights, overcast skies, frosty windows) abound; shocks are mild and few.
June 30, 2013
A cool concept is compromised when this film descends into predictable territory.
October 08, 2012
Unsatisfactory both as a low-budget schlocker and as a piece of entertainment.
June 19, 2012
Once the annoying, two-dimensional characters start getting bumped off one by one, it's just a relief that the actors have stopped improvising their own banal dialogue.
January 09, 2013
There's nothing but many empty scares and zero resolution...
