I don’t want to write about this film.
Not because it’s bad or boring or gave me nothing to work with for a review; y’know, the usual reasons. This is a very good movie, so far from boring that it’s unbelievable, and I have a shit-ton of thoughts on it.
No, the reason I don’t want to write about it is because this is one of those special films that is at its most effective when you go into it knowing as little about it as possible. I went into this with only the initial trailer to go on, which thankfully was more interested in drumming up interest than actually showing the content directly, and what I ultimately got was one of the most buckwild experiences I’ve had with a film all year. This is Malignant levels of nutty filmmaking, and might even go further than that film did in sheer unpredictability.
I’m in a bit of a bind here. Like with any other new film I enjoyed watching, I want to get into all the things about this that I loved seeing… but doing so runs the risk of spoiling the potential experience for the very people I desperately want to convince to check this thing out. I’ve likely gotten into this before, but the literal last thing I want to do with any of these write-ups is to ruin a film for someone else, no matter how much we may disagree on the film itself. I’m not here to dictate or denigrate anyone else’s tastes; I just want to share my thoughts and maybe get someone else to see something they mightn’t have otherwise.
With that in mind, I can either plaster a big fat spoiler warning at the top of this review and carry on as normal… or I can try and put some of that Moonage Daydream inspiration to work and see if I can successfully get into what makes this film so goddamn amazing, but without directly spelling it out. I mean, one of my recent write-up subjects for FilmInk (the fantastic One Piece Film: Red) came to me with a literal list of things not to spoil in the review proper, and I reckon that review turned out good with those stipulations, so let’s see how we go. Wish me luck.
The film starts out with a woman (Georgina Campbell’s Tess) arriving at an AirBnB home for the night… only to discover that, due to an admin error, it has been double-booked with Bill Skarsgård’s Keith already in residence. As they make their way through the awkwardness of their situation, they do their best to co-exist for the time being, until they discover that there’s something… off about this place. That’s as much as the trailer gives away, and I promise, that’s as much as I’ll get into directly.
Both Campbell and Skarsgård are really fucking good in their roles here. Writer/director Zach Cregger’s media experience up to this point has mainly been in comedy, specifically as part of the troupe The Whitest Kids U’Know, and that familiarity with humour does well with the initial interactions. Both the dialogue and the performances do a terrific balancing act of highlighting the paranoia of the situation with some disarmingly light moments, like when they bond over music and documentaries.
Of course, even during the sweeter moments, there is always this uncomfortable atmosphere throughout. Zach Kuperstein’s cinematography, Joe Murphy’s graceful editing, and Anna Drubich’s remarkably subtle soundtrack all blend together to set tensions high, creating a suitable environment where something indeed feels off, but it’s difficult to pin down exactly what it is.
And that goes for the dialogue as well. Cregger reportedly took inspiration from the book The Gift Of Fear, a self-help book about listening to your gut instincts, and in particular its detailing about the importance for women to notice red flags in casual conversation with men. The interactions between these two characters are highly gendered in that regard, as there’s quite a few of those little red flags sprinkled in throughout, which does well at raising the initial tension and feeling of something just under the surface… but also does a great job at setting up the film’s bigger ideas.
Much like the film itself after a while, the ideas at its core show themselves to be much bigger than its setup would imply. In a danced-around nutshell, a lot of what is shown and discussed has to do with the aforementioned interactions and subtly unhealthy behaviour between the genders, but also about the larger history to do with them. And it all starts with the house itself, as the film is mainly about us learning about its own history alongside the characters. It examines notions of gentrification through its Detroit setting, casual sexism in its interactions, and shows how these and many other attitudes are things that have been copied and copied down the years, stretching all the way back to the Reagan years within the film’s own scope.
While maintaining a certain welcomeness in its tone and dialogue, evoking some decent chuckles along with being incredibly tense, it shows a real viciousness in its dissection of the attitudes that allow for people to treat others with such disregard, particularly along gendered lines. What may have started out as necessary paternal and maternal mindsets, over the decades, have become so distorted that they are technically still recognisable, but only if you can look past just how fucking grotesque it’s all become. It’s what happens when you’re in the middle of a deranged large-scale game of Telephone, where it starts with the innocent cries of a baby for its ba-ba… and what you end up getting is the title for this very film.
It’s trickle-down horror, basically. And as horror, this wins points for managing to deliver something genuinely fresh in a market where even the films commenting on the constant retreads are themselves retreads. 2022 has been an exceptionally strong year for horror, and even in that pool, this still stands out as a high-quality offering. But as commentary on societal systems, it effectively draws connections between the past and the now to show how much really hasn’t changed, and uses that to speak truth to power on a lot of different topics. It is an exceptionally clever film, both in its content and in its delivery, and if you think you know what you’re in for just from reading this, believe me: You’re in for a ride with this one.
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