A grim but hackishly assembled horror flick, Do Not Disturb takes a couple of decent ideas for twisty genre fun and puts them through a cheap and dispiritingly familiar filter. The result — inclusive of one of the last performances of Corey Haim — is nothing more than a big yawn.
The film’s story centers around Hollywood screenwriter Don Malek (Stephen Geoffreys), who’s holed up in a seedy hotel working on a diabolical plan for revenge. The twist is that he’s not just writing about a bloodthirsty serial killer, but instead doing some demented air-quote research that actually involves a bunch of nasty killing. Geoffreys has an intriguing off-kilter quality that’s the right match for this sort of material, but writer-director-producer BC Furtney doesn’t plumb Don’s instability in interesting ways, instead preferring to merely cycle mechanically through crap, lowest-common-denominator set-ups and payoffs. The end can’t come soon enough, even for more forgiving horror fans inclined to grade such material on a curve.
Housed in a regular plastic Amaray case stored in a complementary cardboard slipcover, Do Not Disturb comes to DVD presented in 2.35:1 anamorphic widescreen, with a Dolby digital 5.1 surround sound audio track, and optional closed captioning for the hearing-impaired. Unfortunately, apart from some chapter stops, there are no supplemental bonus features contained herein. To purchase the DVD via Half, click here. D- (Movie) D (Disc)