During her first few moments at the cold, Gothic mansion of a school, she sees obvious bad boy Cam (Harrison Gilbertson), a devilishly handsome rogue to whom she is immediately drawn. But then later, she spots quiet and moody Daniel (Jeremy Irvine) and she can't shake the feeling that they've met before. However, Daniel gives her the cold shoulder and all but runs the opposite direction.
She is handed over to fellow student Arianne (Daisy Head, Underworld: Blood Wars) for a tour of the school and it seems Luce will be brought into Ari's clique, until Arianne finds out she's housed on the 3rd floor, AKA the mental ward. Fortunately, bookish and nosy student Penn (Lola Kirke) is right there to step in as Luce's friend and she's a good ally to have, especially since she works in the office and has access to everyone's records. Did I mention she was nosy?
Not everyone is as nice as Penn, though. There's Molly (Sianoa Smit-McPhee), a purple-haired angry girl who bullies and pushes Luce, just to get her into trouble. Then there's Roland (Malachi Kirby), the standoffish dread-locked party king and, finally, there's Gabrielle (Hermione Corfield), the flaxen-haired beauty often seen in the company of Daniel, which is hard for Luce to see, since she has started to crush on Daniel hard.
When an accident happens outside on the school grounds and Daniel saves Lucinda's life just in the nick of time, she has some strange flashbacks or memories. Again, she feels like she knows him from somewhere and she sees flashes of visions of them in times past, but he denies it. Meanwhile, Cam is hitting pretty hard on her and she likes him too, although her draw to Daniel is much stronger. And then there's just the normal school stuff, like religion class, taught by Ms. Sophie (Joely Richardson, 101 Dalmations), who only seems to teach about the war in Heaven and the fall of the angels who didn't pick a side between God and Lucifer. Apparently, all of the fallen angels are stuck here on Earth until the one specific rebel angel picks a side. Unfortunately, just as he did all those years ago, he still chooses love over God or the devil, so stuck they all remain.
When Luce shares her feelings for Daniel with Penn and the thought that they've met before, Penn enlists her computer-savvy crush, Todd (Chris Ashby), to research Daniel on the internet with surprising and shocking results. Unfortunately, tragedy strikes the school and, in the chaos, Luce is hard-pressed to confront Daniel with their findings... until she does. What she discovers will shake her to her core, and she'll realize that not only is she not crazy, but she'll have a huge decision to make and her very life will depend upon it.
As far as paranormal romances go, Fallen is not bad. I'm not a huge Twilight fan, but I've read the first and second books and I've seen a few of the movies. While it's not my favorite genre, I typically enjoy them and, for the most part, I enjoyed Fallen. What I didn't enjoy was the way it ended, with zero resolution and basically a total cliffhanger for the next book/movie. That's so not cool, because not everyone is a fan of the book series and knows what is going to happen next, me included, and it seems that everything that happened in the film was just a big setup for the next installment. Now I have to wait and see if another movie is made, since the sequel has been in "pre-production" for a while now. Overall, the story is pretty good and the acting and chemistry is good. The setting is almost as brooding as the angsty teens that populate it and there are some pretty shocking events that take place during the film. However, it left me cold the way it ended, with me literally saying "Are you kidding me?!" when the Fallen book appeared and closed after the last scene.
There are a couple of special features such as a making-of, a discussion with the author, and cast interviews, but nothing that gave me any hint as to where the story is going, which would have been nice. If you are a fan of the series, you'll probably love this movie. For the rest of us, it's a good story, just go into it knowing in advance that you'll be left wondering what happens next.
