“You may love The Cabin in the Woods as I did; or you may hate
it, but any fan of the horror genre should watch Cabin in the Woods and decide
for him or herself.”
Horror, Dark Fantasy and Satire
Starring - Kristen Connolly as Dana Polk, Chris Hemsworth as
Curt Vaughan, Anna Hutchison as Jules Louden, Fran Kranz as Marty Mikalski,
Jesse Williams as Holden McCrea, Richard Jenkins as Gary Sitterson, Bradley
Whitford as Steve Hadley, Brian White as Daniel Truman and Amy Acker as Wendy
Lin
Director - Drew Goddard
Writers - Joss Whedon and Drew Goddard
Rated R for strong bloody horror violence and gore,
language, drug use and some sexuality/nudity
Runtime - 95 min.
I am a horror film fan. I have been a horror film fan for over fifty years. Some of my earliest movie watching memories are of watching the Universal monster movies. I was particularly enamored of Frankenstein’s monster and even though he gave me nightmares, I insisted on watching Frankenstein, Bride of Frankenstein and Son of Frankenstein whenever they aired on TV. I have followed all the trends of horror films, watching and enjoying the best of them. Despite my dislike of most of the slasher films of the 1980’s/1990’s, the torture-porn of the 2000’s and the recent found footage fad, I have watched all of the best of them and even many of the worst of them. I say all this to give background to my reason for why I think The Cabin in the Woods is the most entertaining horror film I have seen in over a decade!
The Cabin in the Woods is difficult to describe without ruining
the basic premise on which the plot of the film hangs, so I won’t even try. If
you watch the trailer for the film, you can tell that this film is not your
typical teenagers killed in the woods movie. While the film starts out like
every other film of this ilk, it quickly turns into something much deeper, much
more disturbing and most unexpectedly of all… one of the funniest dark satires
of the horror genre ever made.
The Cabin in the Woods is a dark satire of the horror film genre,
but is also perhaps an allegorical parody of our current society as a whole.
Dark humor often plays well to some and not to others, so if you don’t like the
conventions of all the horror films made in the last thirty years satirized, Cabin in the
Woods is not the film for you. However, I personally took Cabin in the Woods to
be so darkly humorous as to be almost farcical. The basic premise of The Cabin
in the Woods – which I won’t spoil here, because I am trying to convince the
few horror film fans that have yet to see it – is the most original, absurd and
humorous that I have seen. If you are a knowledgeable and experienced horror
film fan, I think you’ll notice and appreciate all the horror film tropes that
the film plays with. The Cabin in the Woods is an amazing metaphorical pratfall and
a darkly sinister lark, which plays with the common fears of all modern horror
films by flipping them upside down and inside out. You may love The Cabin in the
Woods as I did; or you may hate it, but any fan of the horror genre should watch The Cabin in the Woods and decide for him or herself.
TECHNICAL: Acting – 9 Directing – 10 Cinematography – 9
Script – 10 Special Effects – 10
VISCERAL: Visual – 10 Auditory – 9 Intellectual – 9 Emotional
– 10 Involvement – 10
TOTAL – 96
