[Early Review] Ready or Not (2019)

Director: Matt Bettinelli-Olpin, Tyler Gillett

Cast: Samara Weaving, Adam Brody, Mark O’Brien, Henry Czerny, Andie MacDowell

Screenplay: Guy Busick, Ryan Murphy

95 mins. Rated R for violence, bloody images, language throughout, and some drug use.

I won’t lie to you. I hadn’t heard or Ready or Not until about six weeks ago when the single trailer dropped for this movie. I don’t think Disney wants to market much of the Fox stuff that they don’t have faith in. The trailer looked silly and fun, and it made me very excited to see it. It could be because I love horror movies, or it could be because I love board games, but something about this one just got me in the trailer. Watching that trailer every time I went to the theater for the past six weeks rocketed this movie up into my Most Anticipated list, and it was so worth it.

It’s a beautiful day for bride Grace (Samara Weaving, Three Billboard Outside Ebbing, Missouri, TV’s SMILF). She’s just married the love of her life, Alex (Mark O’Brien, Bad Times at the El Royale, TV’s Halt and Catch Fire), and not even his snide and disapproving family can ruin the wedding for her. That is, until the wedding night, when she is introduced to the family’s tradition. Alex is a member of the Le Domas family, a wealthy dynasty of the board game industry, and their tradition is to play a game whenever someone new joins the family. Every wedding night, this tradition is kept, and the game for tonight is Hide and Seek, but this isn’t just a game for the Le Domas family or Grace. Their version of Hide and Seek involves crossbows, axes, shotguns, and blood. Now, Grace has to survive until dawn to win and survive, but the Le Domas family are very competitive when it comes to this game, and they will do anything to find her.

This is definitely a film that you need to understand before you go in, but it’s also one I would suggest skipping the trailer for if you are interested (a lot of my favorite moments in the film are revealed in the trailer). Ready or Not is silly and goofy and gory and a hell of a good time. Now, this isn’t the type of horror film to keep you up at night, but for a brisk 95 minutes, it was so much fun. It never takes itself too seriously (because, c’mon, how could it?) and its colorful cast of eccentric characters make for quite an enjoyable experience.

Samara Weaving makes a strong case here for a new scream queen. She belts out some seriously guttural yells in this, and she makes for a compelling and accessible heroine. All she wants at the onset of the film is to be accepted by a family, something she’s been missing her whole life, and now she is thrust into the most absurd of circumstances and forced to fight her new family to save her life. You could make the argument that she gets real violent, real quick, but I would also say that she has an edge about herself from her years of living in fear of being alone that she hardened up.

The Le Domas family is full of very fun characters. Each of them has a specific role to play in the night’s events. I personally loved patriarch Tony (Henry Czerny, Mission: Impossible, TV’s Sharp Objects) as the family leader and his loving-but-firm wife Becky (Andie MacDowell, Groundhog Day, The Last Laugh), but each member of the family has something about them that made them fun to be onscreen.

My one problem with the film is that it puts all of its cards on the table rather early on and I would have liked some of the crazier elements to be slowly unfolded as the film moves along. I think it would have felt less-forced in the narrative to slowly reveal what’s ready going on as opposed to just laying it all out so early.

Directors Matt Bettinelli-Olpin and Tyler Gillett (Devil’s Due, Southbound) have crafted a fun action-horror-comedy hybrid tone for their film which works so very well. I’m doubtful that the new Fox Searchlight regime would want to press forward on a sequel, but I could see a lot of ways to make this into an interesting and fun franchise. Ready or Not is the perfect palate-cleanser for a rough summer movie season. For horror fans, seek this one out. Immediately.

4/5

-Kyle A. Goethe

For my review of Matt Bettinelli-Olpin and Tyler Gillett’s Devil’s Due, click here.

August 20, 2019 3

[31 Days of Horror Part V: A New Beginning] Day 25 – Minutes Past Midnight (2016)

Director: Robert Boocheck, Lee Cronin, Francisco Sonic Kim, Ryan Lightbourn, Marc Martinez Jordan, Kevin McTurk, James Moran, Christian Rivers, Sid Zanforlin

Cast: Jason Flemyng, Barbara Steele, Mika Boorem

Screenplay: Chris Bavota, Robert Boocheck, Lee Cronin, Collin George, Ryan Lightbourn, Marc Martinez Jordan, Guy McDouall, James Moran, Ryan Murphy, Sid Zanforlin

98 mins. Not Rated.

Minutes Past Midnight is another horror anthology (seriously, they are poppin’ up like weeds) released in 2016. This collection takes several popular short film from previous years and works them together into an interesting and odd group of short stories.

Horrific is the story of a Texas goat rancher fighting off a well-known predator from his home. Ghost Train is the tale of two brothers who make a yearly trip to the abandoned fairground where their friend went missing years earlier. Awake is the story of a son’s mysterious illness and the parents struggling to understand. Roid Rage is an exploitation look at the mystery surrounding the deaths of hookers all over town and the FBI agents who discover a shocking culprit. Timothy is the tale of a little boy’s obsession with a children’s TV character. The Mill at Calder’s End is an animated tale in the style of classic Hammer horror and H.P. Lovecraft. Crazy for You is a love story with a murderous twist. Feeder is a parable about artistic passion and the things we are willing to sacrifice for our craft. Never Tear Us Apart is a yarn about two friends who meet some less-than-reputable characters in the woods. Together, these macabre tales form the spine to this spine-tingling horror anthology, Minutes Past Midnight.

Minutes Past Midnight suffers from the same problem that so many anthologies have, the central issue with frustrated tone. Some of the stories in the collection are brutal, some are strange, some are comedic, some are intense, some are horrific, and sadly, very few are memorable. I think of Ghost Train as a particularly engaging tale, but even it feels out of place in this story collection. The Mill at Calder’s End is quite good for completely different reasons. And I think that sums up the central issue of Minutes Past Midnight: many, if not all, of these shorts were not crafted for the anthology framework, and they feel hodge-podged together in a very strange and uncomfortable way. Some of the shorts flat-out do not work, particularly Roid Rage, and the film feels jammed together, because frankly, they are.

This is a collection that would feel better to the viewer if they spaced it out. I’m talking like watch a story, then clean your cat’s litterbox, then watch one, then maybe get a load of dishes going, then Hey! watch one, and finally clean out the garage. Minutes Past Midnight is more of a interesting selection of finds as opposed to an altogether cohesive experience.

This horror anthology is frustrating in its confusing conjunction. It works best when it ceases to be a horror anthology. Some of these shorts work, but not in this format. It’s fun, but because of its failure in creating a mixtape quality of cohesiveness, it never becomes truly memorable. This is one to caution yourself with.

2/5

-Kyle A. Goethe

For my review of the anthology film ABCs of Death 2, click here.

October 25, 2018 1

Cuba Gooding Jr. and Sarah Paulson Join First Season of American Crime Story; In Other News, WTF is American Crime Story?

In the world of weird Hollywood news, I just have to mention this. Ryan Murphy, creator of American Horror Story, has created something of a companion series called American Crime Story which chronicles major crimes like the one I am about to talk on. Cuba Gooding Jr. has jumped on the wagon portraying WAIT-FOR-IT…O.J. Simpson in the true story of the O.J. Simpson trial. Seriously.

Sarah Paulson of American Horror Story has also signed on as Marcia Clark. This is big news kind of. But that doesn’t change the oddity of this news. I honestly think this is a poor idea for a new series and I have been concerned that Ryan Murphy is spreading himself so thin that he isn’t applying the right focus to any one project. When that happens, start waiting on the death knell. Here it comes, Murphy, the dead career bell tolls for thee.

So what do you think of American Crime Story? Does it sound terrible or do you see a silver lining? Let me know!

December 10, 2014 0