THE LAZARUS EFFECT | FAMILY MOVIE REVIEW INFORMATION FOR PARENTS AND KIDS

"THE LAZARUS EFFECT"
(2015) (Olivia Wilde, Mark Duplass) (PG-13)

QUICK TAKE:: Horror: A small team of medical researchers get more than they bargained for when they bring back one of their team members from the dead.

PLOT:

Frank (MARK DUPLASS) and Zoe (OLIVIA WILDE) are an engaged couple who are working together at a university in Berkley. With the help of Clay (EVAN PETERS) and Niko (DONALD GLOVER), they've created the Lazarus serum that they hope to use in allowing medical personnel more time to bring people back from death without any cognitive or other ill-effects. With college student Eva (SARAH BOLGER) getting video of their experiment, they manage to resurrect a dead dog. But some of the team members are concerned with the increased brain activity in the canine as well as his odd and sometimes aggressive behavior.

Unfortunately for them, a large pharmaceutical corporation has purchased the smaller one that had been funding them, and personnel arrive to claim all of the team's research as their own. Realizing they have limited time, the team sneaks back into their lab at night with hopes of replicating their resurrection experiment.

During that, however, Zoe ends up accidentally electrocuted. When normal efforts of resuscitating her fail, a desperate Frank injects her with the serum. It works and brings her back from the dead, but with increased brain activity likewise occurring within her, the team must contend with what they've accidentally unleashed.

WILL KIDS WANT TO SEE IT?: If they're into low-budget horror films, or are fans of anyone in the cast, they might.

WHY THE MPAA RATED IT: PG-13: For intense sequences of horror violence, terror and some sexual references.

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