I am not really a fan of these franchise horror movies. For the most part they go for the gore rather than the story. There are audiences for that type of film I guess, I am just not among them. But having seen two of these films I can see how it is pretty tongue in cheek in the way it has fun with the splatter and special effects--as that is all this film series is about--and not the narrative story that surrounds it.
This one, number 5, is a sort of prequel (there are some references to earlier films that I didn't get until researching it afterwards). It takes place in 2000 which is not quite apparent to the viewer at the start of the film (at least not to me).
Several young adults are going on a business retreat with their overbearing boss (David Koechner). They all work for Presage Paper ("presage," get it?), and the characters are all defined with just enough traits so you can tell them apart. They are all played pretty much by attractive but not well known young actors. There is: Sam, the main character who is supposed to have the premonition of death; he is wavering between the choice of staying here and working for Presage, or pursuing his dreams of being a chef in Paris; his girlfriend Molly who has just broken up with him; co-worker Peter, a Tom Cruise lookalike; Peter's girlfriend, the intern Candice, a college gymnast; Nathan, the young assistant manager of the paper plant who is looked upon with resentment by the plant workers; Olivia, the hottie with the glasses; and Isaac, a boorish co-worker who thinks he is god's gift to women.
During the bus ride to the retreat, Sam has a premonition that he and his coworkers are going to die. The film shows a pretty good sequence on a bridge undergoing some construction repair where everyone dies, except Molly. But this is just a premonition, strong enough to convince Sam to get his friends out and survive.
Later the group sees a mysterious figure (Tony Todd) who tells them death doesn't like to be cheated. There is also a police detective (Courtney B. Vance) who at first thinks Sam is the cause of the accident.
We should already know the premise of the film by now based on the other four--one character has a vision he and others will die; fate has already determined they will die soon despite them already escaping it in a tragic accident; each character fulfills his destiny by dying in a gory way as a result of many Rube Goldbergesque coincidences.
The fun of the film is in how the characters die. Characters are maimed, dismembered, decapitated, body parts fly at you in 3-D, they are sliced and diced and every ick factor is squeezed out for your enjoyment. The deaths in bridge sequence is pretty good, considering the story showed several people killed in the same general environs, so was limited in how they should die. Later in the film, sometimes the sequences trick you into thinking a character will die this way, then slams you with another just-as-(im)plausible way. You cringe with suspense, wondering how a person would die, how long they would suffer, and how gory the death will be. The formulaic storyline itself is the weakest part but if you don't put too much stake into the story, and just enjoy the craziness, you will enjoy it more.
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