See No Evil was a 2006 horror/slasher release distributed by Lionsgate and WWE Studios, directed by Gregory Dark, and stars Kane as the sadistic Jacob Goodnight. The story opens with two cops answering a call to a seedy, ran down looking home. Inside, they meet Jacob and one of his most recent victims, a woman with her eyes gouged out. Jacob kills one of the officers and the other one (Officer Williams) fights him off with a firearm, but not before losing his hand from the swing of an ax in the process. Fast forward 4 years as we meet back up with Williams and a group of various young delinquents that he works with, who have been tasked with community service in exchange for time off their sentence. The service being cleaning up a dilapidated hotel on its last legs. Little do they know, the upper floors of the hotel are inhabited by the monstrous, eye gouging Jacob Goodnight – let the fun begin.
This movie was pretty much classic slasher formula, not giving too much in the element of surprise but providing some brutal kills throughout. Look, you know what you’re getting with a slasher most the time, but I always come back for more. The film got pretty predictable at times, as you just waited for Jacob to come back on screen to see what kind of innovative death sequence would be next. You also didn’t really care too much about the group that was getting terrorized as the acting wasn’t very good from the lot and they didn’t have very many redeeming qualities altogether (minus the formally abused Kira) but that’s also to be expected from the slasher subgenre. Perhaps the most interesting scenes in the film for me personally were the flashbacks to Jacob’s traumatizing past, raised in religious extremism by a horrible and abusive mother. There’s no justifying the brutality that he created in this movie, but at least that helped the character make more sense.
Jacob killed through sin because of his abusive religious freak of a mother, if he saw or judged something as sinful then he lashed out and acted on instinct ultimately leading to victims’ deaths. That made this group of young criminals the perfect prey for him, sinners. That also helps explain why he spared Kira and was infatuated with her tattoos of religious symbolism, like the cross on her back. Perhaps the biggest “dropping the ball” moment this movie had was not killing the film’s douchebag Michael. If you’re familiar with slashers and have watched any in your life, then you know there’s always the resident dick in them, this film’s being Michael. You’ll also know that the dick almost always bites the dust in one of the most satisfying death sequences in the whole movie – and you’re always happy to see them get what’s coming to them. This movie didn’t do that though, Michael was one of the survivors, and even worse, the one who ultimately saved the girls (one of them being an ex that he formally abused). In some sort of hero sequence, that was supposed to get the viewer to believe he had turned a new leaf and was fighting for good now or something. Okay I guess, I would have much rather seen him get brutalized by Jacob but have it your way. This is a WWE film ya know, maybe they were just working a classic heel-face turn into the movie, but it didn’t land as well here as it does in the wrestling world.
Overall, if you’re a wrestling fan, this is a fun watch as you get to see the demonic Kane embody a slasher villain, a role judging by his wrestling character that fits him like a glove. If you’re a slasher fan, this is also an enjoyable enough watch, it will at least satisfy the hunger as it provides some innovative kills and an original and interesting lead character in Jacob Goodnight. Aside from that, I can’t see this movie being very well received by the novice horror fans just looking for a good thrill. This movie almost feels like it was hoping to branch out to more people than it ultimately did, you don’t hear a lot of horror fans bring this one up still if they’re not a wrestling fan as well.
