Stay Alive

Stay Alive
Theatrical release poster
Directed by	William Brent Bell
Produced by	Peter Schlessel James D. Stern Matthew Peterman McG
Written by	William Brent Bell Matthew Peterman
Starring	Jon Foster Samaire Armstrong Frankie Muniz Jimmi Simpson Milo Ventimiglia Sophia Bush Adam Goldberg
Music by	John Frizzell
Cinematography	Alejandro Martinez
Edited by	Mark Stevens
Production company	Hollywood Pictures Spyglass Entertainment Endgame Entertainment Wonderland Sound and Vision Stay Alive Productions
Distributed by	Walt Disney Studios Motion Pictures (US) Universal Pictures (UK)
Release date	March 24, 2006
Running time	Theatrical cut 85 min. Director's Cut 100 min.
Country	United States
Language	English
Budget	$9 million
Box office	$27.1 million

Stay Alive is a 2006 slasher film directed by William Brent Bell, who cowrote it with Matthew Peterman. It was produced by McG, co-produced by Hollywood Pictures and released on March 24, 2006 in the US. In the U.S. the film was rated PG-13 for horror violence, disturbing images, language, and brief sexual and drug content. This was the first film in five years released by Hollywood Pictures.

The film opens with a character in a video game entering an eerie mansion. He is followed throughout the mansion by a woman in a red dress, who kills him by hanging him from a chandelier. The man playing the game is Loomis Crowley (Milo Ventimiglia), and the game is called Stay Alive. Loomis later wakes up to find his roommate and his roommate's girlfriend slaughtered. He is then hanged from a chandelier and killed, similar to the way he died in the game.

The next day at work, while talking with his boss, Miller (Adam Goldberg), Hutch (Jon Foster) learns that Loomis is dead. At the funeral, he meets a girl named Abigail (Samaire Armstrong). Afterward, Hutch goes to an internet cafe owned by his girlfriend, October (Sophia Bush), and her brother, Phineas (Jimmi Simpson), both avid gamers. Hutch has received a bag of Loomis' possessions, and while looking through it, Phin finds "Stay Alive". Although Hutch is reluctant, they decide to play as a group. Abigail and another friend, Swink (Frankie Muniz) join in, with Miller playing online from his office. The game is set in a derelict mansion on Garouge Plantation, but it won't start until the six players recite "The Prayer of Elizabeth." It's a creepy request for "all who resist" to perish so that their blood might keep her young. The players create their characters and fight through a cemetery full of evil ghosts of children, heading toward a mausoleum and tower. Miller touches a rose and the game directs him to pick it. A student of the occult, October explains that undead spirits cannot move across wild roses. Miller goes down to the basement, but the door slams shut and separates him from the other players. Upstairs, Abigail enters a secret passage in a wardrobe. In the room, she locates Elizabeth's diary with the prayer inside of it. Hutch notices that all the mirrors in the game are broken. Meanwhile, in the basement, Miller finds a torture room full of undead girls. Scared, he throws down the rose which dispels the spirits. Now out of roses, the woman in red can stab Miller's unprotected character. The words "Game Over" cross the screen and the group decides to call it a night. Minutes later, the woman in red appears in Millers office and kills him by stabbing him in the neck with conjoined scissor blades like the ones in the game.