I think this is a new genre that they're all sort of working their way through it and haven't got all the kinks worked out yet but it's a genre that works for me.

There is, somehow, an interesting story here, as well as some good acting. There are also some good scenes

Great movie. Not sure what people expected but I found it highly entertaining.

One of the film's great tricks is that, for a time, you think it will go down a rabbit hole of unrealistic glorification.

The biggest problem with "The Skulls" is that it's un-memorable. It isn't terrible but doesn't offer any surprises or thrills either. Basically it's about a three best friends (Joshua Jackson as Luke, Leslie Bibb as Chloe and Hill Harper as Will) who attend college together. Everything is fine and dandy until Luke gets invited to join a secret society on campus known as The Skulls. He makes new friends (most prominently Paul Walker as Caleb) and doesn't want anything to do with his old ones and if that wasn't bad enough, the secret society turns out to be pretty sinister.The plot starts off promising, with Joshua Jackson and Paul Walker's characters bonding (due to their new connection in the Skulls) coming in and disturbing the friendship that is set up between the likable characters in the introduction. From then on the film doesn't really take any chances and goes for the easy route, with standard evil secret society stuff, a predictable murder mystery and a shoehorned love story. Some of the plot points are ridiculous and contrived; like vaults of incriminating security tapes (despite a clearly corrupt leadership that readily disposes of damning evidence), a plot to send a whistle blower to an insane asylum (instead of simply killing him when we've seen that the Skulls have no qualms about killing people) and a problem that in the 21st century could easily be solved in a few minutes (using news media or the internet). For younger, less discriminating audiences this might be entertaining but if you've ever seen any movie with a secret society or cult, you've seen this film before and probably better. (On DVD, November 18, 2012)

In the late 90s a lot of supposedly mysterious themes were explored in movies. Urban Legends, ghosts, nuclear power, vampires, the list goes on. In the Skulls, teen movies decide to take a look at secret societies.The film stars Joshua Jackson as Luke McNamara, a young rower who wants to study for a law degree. But as a poor townie, it's going to be an uphill struggle to finish, unless a secret society known as the Skulls decides to make him a member.Of course they do make him a member. The first thing we learn about secret societies is that they endorse the buddy system, and Luke is paired with Caleb Mandrake (the late Paul Walker), a boxer. Luke's room mate Will, decides it would achieve something to break into The Skulls secret chamber, and does so. Sadly all it achieves in doing is annoying Caleb, who pushes Will down a ledge, knocking him out. Caleb's father and Skulls big-wig Judge Litten (Craig. T. Nelson) tells his son he'll take care of it and orders some subordinates to kill Will and make it look like a hanging.Luke is pretty shaken up about his friend's death, but not as shaken up as Caleb, who believes he killed the man. The rest of the movie is pretty much Luke working out what happened to his friend with help from another senior Skull Senator Ames Everitt (CSI's William L. Peterson), and love interest Chloe (Leslie Bibb). The ending is pretty satisfying without delivering anything unexpected.The Skulls is a bit ridiculous at times, but it does work reasonably well in its own right. There's enough going on to keep you interested and the performers are all invested enough in the story to put out a sincere product. It is very much a product of its time, but fans of the era should check it out if they are looking for a trek down nostalgia lane. Not essential viewing by any means, but worth checking out if it comes on cable.

This contains a "spoiler": I don't expect to see a Hollywood movie about a secret society as prominent as Skull and Bones to have the reality of the loss of morality that entails such membership, and the resulting cruelty involved in interpersonal relationships which parallel the outer violence the creed of "War" entails, but at least there is a Hollywood movie that touches on this subject.The plot engrossed me up to the point of the "murder"/"accident" which was made to look like a suicide. The players involved in the cover- up appeared sad and sentimental about what had happened. I think the actual reality would be much more sinister. There would be callous indifference to the death and it would probably have been more like murder than an accident. An outsider who violates the privacy of the inner sanctum of the ritual chamber will get "suicided", and not in an accident. This was indeed hinted at, but made to look viewer-friendly as if the people involved in the cover up were sorry and sad. It might have been more realistic and thus the film more believable if the people who put the body into a fake suicide might be smirking and gloating in their power, since that is most likely the honest and real response. It would have shown the cruelty and violence inherent in such an organization. In addition, that bribe offered to the "hero", with a prepaid law school acceptance into any law school as a "get out of jail free" card would greedily and easily have been taken up and the glittery party would have continued for all involved. That would have shown the absolute lack of morality and concern for other human beings that this type of "power" does to the human spirit. Instead the movie relied on a well-used formula of the mundane hero resisting evil on the path to righteousness. That does not reflect the actual state of morality in the US nor in the fight to be accepted into the halls of power.

predictable, i saw every thing that was going to happen. But most people want that in movies so there brains do not have to go out side of the boxThis movie is about a secret group and controls things the old fashion way. I do think this movie could have been a really good movie with a lot of changes, some better actors and plot changes. But lets but all that aside and be a normal person watching a movie, it was good.... it was not bad by any means. Would i tell some one to watch this movie? yes, i think that every one should see it at least once. This movie was made over 10 years ago, if you think of all the others movies coming out at the end of the 90's this was really pretty good.Watch it! Don't expect the world!