'My Little Eye' rolls, and yours will, too

Yes, reality shows are scary. Yes, the idea of a movie about terrorized contestants on a reality show is potentially scary. And no, the low-budget horror film "My Little Eye" isn't scary at all; just witless and utterly pointless.

(Now, if you wanted to put together, say, a disgruntled runner-up from "American Idol," and a color-blind designer from "Trading Spaces," and somebody from "Fear Factor" who eats the kind of things most of us don't even like to think about, and maybe Monica Lewinsky, who I hear has a new career as some sort of reality-show chaperone, and lock them all up in a remote old house — OK, then maybe you'd have something that could give "The Exorcist" a run for its money. But I digress.)

Anyway, "My Little Eye" features five attractive young people who pack up their lip gloss and sporty outfits to go live in the aforementioned house together, their every move captured by cameras and broadcast on the Internet. If they last six months, they win $1 million; if anyone leaves early, they get nothing.

Pity there's no prize for lasting through the interminable 95 minutes of "My Little Eye," in which the residents get freaked out, scream, have sex, mistrust each other, find bloody hammers in odd places, and express fear through such lines as "I suddenly feel all on display." (This last comes from a young woman who suddenly thinks — hello? — that someone's watching them. In general, let's just say that nobody in this house is anxiously awaiting their SAT scores.)

Director Marc Evans ("Resurrection Man"), who surely has better things to do with his time, can't seem to find any sort of groove here; the movie just drones on to its bloody conclusion and the characters remain interchangeable. Even the look of the film is annoying, veering from grainy light to green-drenched Webcam footage presumably shot in the dark; it's like watching a movie through a layer of pond scum, and about as much fun.

Moira Macdonald: 206-464-2725 or mmacdonald@seattletimes.com