We now expect something creepy and new from Asian directors. But after seeing three "Saw" movies and "Hostel," we need more from a horror story. Ghost thrillers just can't deliver on the savage bloodletting, so there has to be a really good story. "The Messengers'" has no story but a lot of scary moments. It is not enough.

The story is terrible. Let me explain: The Solomon's have moved to a farm because the dad, Roy (Dylan McDermott), used to live in the area and he always wanted to be a sunflower farmer. Of course he has a complaint dutiful wife, Denise (Penelope Ann Miller), who wears dresses on a working farm, and a taciturn teenage daughter Jess (Kristen Stewart). Something horrible happened that forced the family to move from the city to a small town in Nowhere, North Dakota. That something involved Jess.

I quickly figured it out: Jess got high and shook to death her toddler brother's twin. Her 18-month old brother, Benny (Evan Turner), hasn't said a word since that awful day six months ago.

Benny is the quietest toddler I've ever seen! I bet his parents are glad he doesn't cry or talk.

My story, and the fact that Jess is the right age for poltergeist activity to emerge after a crisis, made better sense to me then what happens here.

Happily, Roy starts cleaning up the "High Tension" farm. Jess is no farmer, but she does like to go down to the basement. She doesn't go to school. Maybe its summer break.

My grandmother's house had a sub-basement where the bogeyman lived. Everyone in the neighborhood knew he lived there. He even had his own underground entrance! I never went down there without my mother.

Within days of fixing up the John Deere, Roy meets a stranger looking for work. Not only can Burwell (John Corbett – didn't he promise to give up acting for country western singing?) stay, he is given the worker's cottage as his very own and a place at the Solomon's table. Roy doesn't have a clue who the stranger is. He doesn't ask around town. He doesn't seem to mind this wild-haired, non-groomed bulk of a man with a rifle slung over his shoulder living so close to his nubile daughter and ripe wife.

Okay, I thought. He's a ghost. No, you are so wrong Victoria!

The farm has a violent history attached to it, but no one in the town is willing to say anything to the nice Solomons. And who the hell is Colby Price (William B. Davis)? Why is he always turning up asking to buy the farm for 15% over its selling price? When the writer slips this strange man into the story and then does not explain his ties to the story, you know this was a patched-up, who cares project.

The Pangs, Oxide Pang Chun and Danny Pang, know how to film scary scenes, build tension and evoke visual terror, but the screenplay by Mark Wheaton with a story by Todd Farmer, is trite, uninteresting, and bland. Why didn't Wheaton build some tension between Burwell and Denise? Burwell does give Jess a creepy child-molester look but Roy should have picked up on it. And why is Roy wearing a black wig? Did Farmer slap this story together waiting on line at an ATM? How did he and Wheaton get this gig?

I would rather know this then ask them how to dope out the story. Nothing ties neatly up.

(We at zboneman.com are excited to welcome the prolific and multi-talented writer Victoria Alexander to our staff. Critic for http://www.filmsinreview.com/ and pundit and humorist responsible for the candid and fearlessly funny "The Devil's Hammer," her column appears every Monday on http://fromthebalcony.com. Start off your week with a good hard laugh. It's a thrill to have her on board. Victoria Alexander answers every email and can be contacted directly at .)