The movie: “Dreamcatcher.” The tagline: “Four friends hung a dreamcatcher in their cabin. It’s about to catch something it cannot stop.”

Well, these four friends should have hung a dreamcatcher in the movie theatres, so patrons could avoid spending six dollars on a bad movie. The story is of four childhood friends who have grown up and returned to a cabin they share to catch up on old times. All four are different, to say the least, and they can give thanks to their friend Duddits (Donnie Wahlberg) for their uniqueness.

However, their excursion into the forest takes a turn for the worst when the friends happen about a stranger. It also stars Morgan Freeman, Thomas Jane, Jason Lee, Damian Lewis, and Tom Sizemore, but even all this talent could not salvage this genre-hopping mix-match.

This movie gives the pretense of being a wonderful horror movie in its opening credits, but upon the arrival of the antagonistic elements the movie becomes increasingly bizarre. Perhaps it is because the movie shows you the ‘scary thing,’ and it is no longer scary.

However, the script and direction of this film have to take some of the blame too. The script becomes absurd as the audiences are brought deeper into the plot, and despite the amazing double performance of Damian Lewis who plays ‘Jonesy’, the acting begins to follow suit. Lines are delivered in a melodramatic fashion that belong in a soap opera.

The movie does have some redeeming qualities such as the relationships between the four, or five if you include Duddits. There is a history with them, and it shows. These aren’t four men who met the other day, but go back to childhood. The scenes that focus on these relationships stand out the most and very interesting. When the action sequences, which tend to be surreal and unfocused, the empathy for the characters loses its hold.

For most, wait until the movie hits the video store. However, for those Matrix fans that want to see the premiere of the “The Flight of the Osiris,” go ahead and spend the money. The CGI-animated, ten-minute flick is well worth the money spent. The animation is impressive and very life-life, and within those short, few minutes the empathy drawn for those characters greatly outweighs that drawn for the characters in “Dreamcatcher.”