Haven is precisely the sort of film you can imagine being pitched to actors as "a working vacation with an easy paycheck." I certainly can't picture any of the actors who appear here (Bill Paxton, Orlando Bloom, Stephen Dillane, Zoe Saldana, Anthony Mackie, Joy Bryant, Bobby Cannavale) being drawn in by writer/director Frank E. Flowers' script -- a laughably over-heated piece of melodrama that, bizarrely, seems to incorporate elements of "Laguna Beach" and "Romeo & Juliet." Yup, it's that desperate. However, if your unfamiliarity with the title persists, that might owe to the considerable lag between Haven's completion, its 2004 debut at the Toronto International Film Festival, a limited release in September and now its unceremonious, end-of-year arrival on DVD. I can appreciate a good sun, skin and surf flick as much as the next guy, but I can only suspend my disbelief for so much.

Dishonest American businessman Carl Ridley (Paxton) hustles his newly 18-year-old daughter Pippa (Agnes Bruckner) off the cheerleading practice field one Miami afternoon, throwing her onto a plane bound for the Grand Cayman islands. An investment deal with the mysterious British banker Mr. Allen (Dillane) has gone very wrong, leaving Carl in a state of panic about his finances, while also worrying about the influence of troublemaker Fritz (Victor Rasuk). At the same time, Shy (Bloom) and Andrea (Saldana) are hiding their illicit love from their conservative parents that doesn't slip by Hammer (Mackie), Andrea's over-protective brother. You can see -- well, probably not -- that the filmmakers are working to tie all of this together in a manner that fits in with the current crop of temporally unmoored films; telling a story in a straightforward, coherent manner is so Eighties, man.

The case trumpets the film as being the product of the team behind Oscar winner Crash, another piece of cinema tied together by coincidence and chance; the only difference between the two films is that with Crash, you at least somewhat cared about the characters, whereas in Haven, it's all sound and fury, signifying nothing. Bordering on ludicrous by its climax, Haven doesn't wrap itself up neatly so much as it explodes all over the screen in a messy, senseless fashion. There's crap and then there's crap -- Haven doesn't even have the decency to have a sense of humor about it all.

The Video:

Haven looks absolutely beautiful in its 1.85:1 anamorphic widescreen transfer that handles the highly stylized cinematography with nary a hint of defect -- crisp, vivid and saturated, the film looks near perfect, especially considering its long-delayed arrival for mass public consumption. Inexplicably, Fox has also provided a 1.33:1 fullscreen transfer on the flipside.

Matching the picture step-for-step is the equally robust and immersive Dolby Digital 5.1 soundtrack, with easily heard dialogue and crisp musical cues that provides a brief work-out for your sub. Optional English and Spanish subtitles are also on board.

Unsurprisingly, there aren't many supplements to sink your teeth into: the three minute, 26 second making-of featurette, along with the film's theatrical trailer and trailers for Winter Passing and Find Me Guilty is all she wrote.

Bordering on ludicrous by its climax, Haven doesn't wrap itself up neatly so much as it explodes all over the screen in a messy, senseless fashion. There's crap and then there's crap -- Haven doesn't even have the decency to have a sense of humor about it all. Skip it.