The Cabin In the Woods Review
Awesome in almost all ways, but honestly I was expecting a little more from Joss Whedon.
As far as horror movies go, this one is pretty amazing. It is extremely derivative in almost all ways, with elements taken from the Evil Dead, Friday the 13th, Hellraiser, Resident Evil, the Omen, and pretty much every other horror movie know to man. However, like a great assemblage artist Joss and Drew Goddard (Cloverfield) have fit the borrowed pieces into a new artwork who’s sum is greater than the combined value of the individual parts.
That being said, there were two things that annoyed me during the course of this film (sorry Joss. I am still a huge fan of all your work). The first one is spoilers. I hate spoilers and work to avoid them in my reviews (or at least throw in a spoiler warning). In this film, however, it opens up to a spoiler and keeps on going. The spoiler element added a different twist on the overriding horror of the story (basically adding an active and malevolent intelligence directing what was going on) but really took away a lot of the adrenaline inducing surprise behind every event. It’s tough to be surprised by a creature when a bunch of guys are watching it approach the cabin on a TV monitor. That being said, there were still plenty of surprises left and you will be jumping fairly often.
The second issue has a tertiary spoiler in it, so if you don’t want it then skip ahead one paragraph. The thing that bugged me was what I like to call “the dumb super villain kill switch”. I am not going to get too far into the story on this one as I really don’t want to throw in more of a spoiler than absolutely necessary, but if you have an evil plan do not put in a big, giant red self destruct button that can be easily accessed by a couple of dopey kids. I have passwords for pretty much everything in the universe. Did no one think to password protect the self destruct button, if not from meddling kids than from the occasional disgruntled employee? For that matter why even put in a single button that can destroy everything? You don’t see ships with a scuttle button on the bridge for the captains girlfriend to trip and fall onto. (Curses Foiled Again image courtesy of the Funny T Shirt category).
Anyway, the story is of five college kids (the jock, the slut, the brain, the virgin, and the stoner) head off to a vacation in a cabin that basically has “Impending Doom” written on every board and nail. There are some mitigating circumstances that explain why they are so dumb later but early on you actually want to see them die for stupidity. There are some people apparently running everything from a hi tech secret base underground for nebulous reasons. They make a long series of really bad decisions and are attacked by zombies. Horror hijinks ensue. Secrets are revealed, and more and more horror movies are either spoofed or ripped off. I don’t want to get into the story any more than that.
The stars. The story starts off with you scratching your head and thinking it’s kind of dumb but ends up really cool in concept and execution. Two stars. All of the kids in the movie turn out to be decent actors and deliver a good performance laced with nuance (since I glossed over it they are Kristen Connolly-the Happening, Mona Lisa Smile; Chris Hemsworth-Star Trek, Thor; Anna Hutchinson-Power Rangers Jungle Fury, Go Girls, Wendy Wu: Homecoming Warrior (sorry about this Anna but I just burst out laughing. I sincerely hope you get more and better roles.); Fran Kranz-Training Day, Donny Darko, the Village; and Jesse Williams-Grays Anatomy, the Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants, Brooklyn’s Finest). One star. There are some points that have you jumping out of your seat. One star. Both of the girls are easy on the eyes. One star. Anna Hutchinson does a completely gratuitous (and highly appreciated) topless scene. One star. The creatures are really horrible, and the CGI and special effects really good. One star. The way they got the disparate elements of different movies and genres to meld seamlessly into a great movie was awesome to watch. One star. Overall a fun movie. One star. Total: nine stars.
The black holes. The fact that the entire movie has spoilers built in rather than delivering the information in an expository style. One black hole. The whole thing I talked about earlier (that might be a spoiler). One black hole. While I appreciate the purposefully derivative nature of this film, it made the story pretty predictable. You don’t have to have read the script to figure out who was most likely to die. One black hole. Total: three black holes.
A grand total of six stars. Really good for horror, but honestly not at the level I would expect for a Joss Whedon joint. I left the movie thinking that the man who wrote Out of Gas or Objects in Space from Firefly could have done better. Should you see it? Absolutely, in a theater as soon as possible. It is good enough and different enough to be worthy of your attention for those alone, but honestly we need to keep on supporting Joss so he keeps making great stuff. Good date movie? Yes, as long as she can handle horror. Odds are she will be in your lap with fright pretty early on. If she is a Buffy or Firefly fan you have the perfect excuse to get her to the movie. If on the other hand she doesn’t like horror then maybe you should just go see it with your friends.
Before I go I want to add a thought on what I see as an ugly trend towards the overuse of zombies in media. While I appreciate the aesthetic choice to make zombies the baddies in this one I am afraid we are rapidly reaching the saturation point for zombies. This is of course the inevitable conclusion of any popular trend as Hollywood gets a hold of anything cool and milks it so hard all the internal organs come out of the teats, but I for one am a little disappointed that this trend is coming to an end. I have been a zombie fan since high school (which is a long time ago) and at the risk of sounding like every hipster I hate was into them way before they became cool.
Anyway, thanks for reading. More to see coming up, including the true horror movie of this weekend, the Three Stooges. I expect it to truly suck, which is why I have opted to see it tomorrow on cheap movie day. Lockout could either suck or rule, but the trailers I have seen reek of badly of cheese so we will see. Maybe I will make tomorrow a two movie day. Follow me on Twitter @NerdKungFu. If you have any suggestions or questions email me at [email protected]. Specific comments about this review can be made right here for all the world (wide web) to see. Talk to you soon.
Dave