Final Destination

After a teenager has a terrifying vision of him and his friends dying in a plane crash, he prevents the accident only to have Death hunt them down, one by one.

Critics were sharply divided at release, with the majority finding the premise squandered by flat execution and performances, while a vocal minority — including Roger Ebert — thought it delivered genuine suspense in the vein of early Scream. The central disagreement was whether the death-cheats-back concept was inventively handled or simply wasted; most contemporary reviewers landed on the latter, though audience enthusiasm and later critical reassessment suggest the film found its defenders over time. Devon Sawa's lead performance drew scattered praise even from mixed reviews.