When you finished watching DONNIE DARKO, did you sit back and wonder whatever happened to the little girl in Sparkle Motion after the events of the film? Yeah, neither did I. And apparently the producers didn't either, given the extreme lack of thought, imagination, or purpose behind this unwanted sequel to Richard Kelly's cult classic. 
THE FILM A stunning waste of time. The film stars
Daveigh Chase as Samantha Darko, Donnie's younger sister. The film opens seven years after the events of the first film, as Samantha and her annoying cunt of a best friend Corey (
Briana Evigan) are taking a cross-country trek. Their car breaks down, trapping them in a small Utah town with the usual cast of small-town weirdos. Almost immediately, they're picked up by brooding rebel heartthrob Randy (
Ed Westwick), who attempts to fix their car. However, evil forces begin to descend upon them, and it becomes clear that Donnie's wormhole has made another appearance to fold the events surrounding them all. The only redeeming thing about this production is the cinematography by
Marvin V. Rush, which is lush and layered. Everything else is complete trash. The screenplay by
Nathan Atkins is merely an incompetent rehashing of Kelly's DARKO mythology, except that Atkins appears to have little understanding of the mechanics of the universe. All of the elements are repeated: the church burning, the movie theater, the rabbit head, the force fields ... but none of it makes a lick of sense in the film. For instance, the rabbit head of the first film related to that film's climax; here it's merely a creation that serves only to reference the first film. It has no bearing on the story at hand. Stupid. Besides that, Atkins' screenplay is incoherently written. Characters who have just met begin talking to each other as if they've always known one another. For instance, the two girls are stranded at the beginning of the film.
Ed Westwick's character shows up, and all three start chit chatting like they went to high school together. This happens repeatedly throughout the script. It's lazy. The characters are, one and all, horrible. There is not one single person here to root for throughout the film. Samantha drifts around constantly moping. Her friend is one of the most repugnant creatures on the face of the Earth, constantly snapping nasty, smart ass comments at everyone. The town is filled with perverts, weirdos, and phony evangelicals. There isn't one believable character written here. Making it worse are the performers expected to bring these shitty characters to life. Chase is lifeless as Samantha Darko. I understand the character is supposed to be troubled, but Chase has almost no ability to project onscreen. Evigan takes the horrible character given to her and makes her five hundred times worse, whispering every snide remark like a drugged-up snake. Westwick was apparently directed to stand around and look pretty, given the fact that his entire performance consists of rebel posing. Every other performance is laughable and amateurish. Only
Matthew Davis manages to inject any reasonable depth or dimension to his performance as the troubled Pastor John. Beyond that, the technical credits are mostly horrible outside of the aforementioned cinematography. Worst of all are the special effects, which appear to have been made using a cannibalized Atari. The fire effects may have been Photoshopped directly onto the frame. Awful. This sequel did not need to be made. It was done without creator Richard Kelly's approval. The final product fails on almost every single level. An abomination.
EXTRAS Hilariously, this disc contains extra material that clearly demonstrates the lack of insight or understanding behind this production.
THE MAKING OF S.DARKO - Here we get to look into the mind of madness as we listen to the producers attempt to justify making this movie. As if there was some other motivation other than money.
BEST PART: various crew and cast members are asked what the movie is about, and nobody can come up with a reasonable answer!!!! They all fumble around trying to sum up the point of the film, and they simply cannot figure it out. One crew member says it's "about an hour and forty minutes long." Exactly.
UTAH TOO MUCH - Some of the cast wrote a song during the long pointless breaks in the production. It sucks.
OVERALL Skip this thing if you love DONNIE DARKO or life itself.