As Chernobyl Diaries opens, we see that Chris (Jesse McCartney), his girlfriend Natalie (Olivia Taylor Dudley), and their friend Amanda (Devin Kelley) are traveling across Europe. They reach Kiev where Chris is reunited with his expatriate brother, Paul (Jonathan Sadowski). The plan is to travel with Paul to Moscow, but he has other plans. Paul introduces the group to Uri (Dimitri Diatchenko), a man who specializes in “extreme tours”. Uri states that he can take the group to Pripyat, a town adjacent to Chernobyl, where the nuclear disaster occurred in 1986. Chris, Natalie, and Amanda reluctantly agree and they are soon joined on the tour by a couple -- Michael (Nathan Phillips) and Zoe (Ingrid Bolso Berdal). They travel cross-country in Uri’s old SUV and are stopped at a check point, where the guards will not allow them in. So, Uri takes a shortcut to Pripyat. Once there, they find a ghost town. The area housed the Chernobyl workers and their families and when the nuclear reactor exploded, they had to evacuate immediately. Thus, the place looks untouched, but deserted. The group explores for a while and then Uri tells them that it’s time to leave. However, getting out of Pripyat proves to be difficult and as night falls, the tourists realize that they are not alone.

Again, let’s give credit where credit is due. The basic idea in Chernobyl Diaries is a sound one and the idea of exploring a ghost town is a solid premise for a horror movie, so kudos to Peli for that. However, a quick search of the internet will reveal that this is not the first story to be set in Pripyat, much less the first one to tackle similar issues. In September, 2009, the television show Destination Truth visited Pripyat in the episode “Ghosts of Chernobyl”. However, let’s still be generous and say that Peli may have been on to something when he thought of exploring this doomed city after dark. One of the problems with Chernobyl Diaries is that he handed screenplay writing duties to Carey and Shane Van Dyke, the grandsons of Dick Van Dyke. That famous celebrity aside, these two have spent most of their time writing and starring in features for The Asylum. If you don’t know what that means, then you are lucky.

To its credit, the first act of Chernobyl Diaries works. The film opens with video footage of Chris, Amanda, and Natalie visiting various European sites. Seeing this and knowing that Peli is connected to the movie, we assume that it’s going to be another “found footage” movie, but the style changes after just a few minutes to a more conventional narrative style. The reunion with Paul is brief and we are suddenly traveling with Uri to Pripyat. The locations used in Chernobyl Diaries, which are not (as far as I can tell) actually Pripyat, are excellent and we really get a sense of doom and foreboding. The best scene in the film comes here, as a truly surprising beast makes a cameo.

But, as soon as night falls, the movie has no idea what to do with itself. Any sense of story suddenly goes away and the movie devolves into a series of scenes in which the group runs around and screams. All of the promises made by the first half of the film go unfulfilled as the “plot” comes grinding to a halt. It’s made clear that packs of wild dogs patrol Pripyat (fulfilling the suspicions of Ricky Bobby), but we also know that something else is in the city pursuing and attacking the group. However, as the story has left the building, the movie only focuses on watching the group run and dwindle in numbers, instead of focusing on the villains.

While the movie is technically not a “found footage” movie, Director Bradley Parker (who comes from a visual effects background) has opted to shoot the movie with a hand-held “you are there!” style, so it often feels like a “found footage” film which simply contains a score and more editing. This means that Chernobyl Diaries can use that “found footage” cheating technique of not showing something sinister, instead focusing on the characters as they run away. I must say that the shot which opens the next to last scene is very nice and appropriately chilling, but it’s too little, too late.

Chernobyl Diaries reinforced the notion that I have no interest whatsoever in traveling to Eastern Europe on Blu-ray Disc courtesy of Warner Home Video. The film has been letterboxed at 1.85:1 and the Disc contains an AVC 1080p HD transfer which runs at an average of 18 Mbps. The image is very sharp and clear, showing no overt grain and no defects from the source materials. The colors look very good, although Parker has given the movie a slightly faded look. The daytime shots show a nice crispness and an appreciable amount of depth. The nighttime scenes are dark at times, with some of these being shot by flashlight. Overall, the video looks fine. The Disc carries a DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 track which runs at 48 kHz and an average of 3.5 Mbps. The track provides clear dialogue and sound effects. The stereo and surround effects are put to good use in the city, as we are treated to sounds coming from the sides and the rear which alert us to something happening off-screen. These effects are noticeable, but not always very detailed. The separation of left and right channels is good. The subwoofer effects in the “shock” sequences are effective.

The Chernobyl Diaries Blu-ray Disc contains only four extras. "Uri's Extreme Tours Infomercial" (1 minute) is a fake commercial for Uri's special tours. It shows that he advertises the Chernobyl tours. "Chernobyl Conspiracy Viral Video" (2 minutes) begins with facts about the disaster at Chernobyl, but then wanders into speculation territory as it wonders what happened to some of the workers and what the government may be hiding. The Disc contains one DELETED SCENE which runs about 1 minute. It's simply a dialogue scene with Paul welcoming the group to Kiev. We also get an ALTERNATE ENDING (2 minutes) which is extremely similar to that of the finished film, with the only difference being how depressing one character's fate is.