'Final Destination Bloodlines' makes the everyday item terrifying

A blender. A lawn mower. A ceiling fan. A garden rake. A vending machine. An MRI scanner. These mundane items are supposed to ease us through life, helping us eat, clean, keep cool, stay healthy.

- Associated Press

They're not supposed to be evil. But in "Final Destination Bloodlines," as in the entire 25-year franchise, ordinary objects become fearsome tools of murderous mayhem. And they do it through intricate sequences akin to Rube Goldberg machines — those contraptions that make simple tasks complex through elaborate chain reactions. We doubt Goldberg intended for a nose ring to interact with a ceiling fan in quite the way seen here, but whatever.

There's some ingenious chaos cooked up here by co-directors Zach Lipovsky and Adam B. Stein, who said at the film’s premiere this week that they hope people will be watching this, the franchises’s sixth installment (and 14 years after the last), through their fingers — but with smiles on their faces.

To which I must confess I muttered to myself: “No way I'm going to be smiling.” I braced to feel jumpy and miserable for two hours. But sure enough I was soon smiling, even giggling. Turns out, horror films are a lot easier to handle when they're funny. Even more so when they're witty. A spoonful of wit, as Mary Poppins might say, helps the bloody mayhem go down.