Cottage Country

Malin Akerman (Watchmen) and Tyler Labine (Reaper) are Cammie and Todd, one of those awful couples that have cutesy nicknames for each other. They plan on spending a momentous romantic vacation at Todd's parents cabin by the lake, but when his slacker brother shows up with his girlfriend this go quickly from bad to worse,

A proper black comedy needs to mix the comedy with the macabre. Look at Heathers for black comedy done right. Hell look at Very Bad Things, a film that this one has a passing resemblance to. Both the aforementioned films work because of this mixture. Cottage Country does not. The dark moments aren't funny, the funny scenes not particularly dark. The film is passable entertainment but only marginally so. It's not terrible, just not funny and overlong.

If you miss the tagline of this movie, expect to be surprised!

Seeing the first 20 minutes of the movie you might think that you are watching something between a romantic comedy and a National Lampoon's kind of film. Todd (Tyler Labine) and Cammie (Malin Akerman) are an unmarried couple, trying to get a short break of their hardworking daily routine by going to Todd's family cottage for the weekend. Todd is also planning to propose to Cammie in the most romantic place he can think of, by the lake!

The troubles began when Todd's loafer brother (Dan Petronijevic) and his weird girlfriend (Lucy Punch) arrive at the cottage without a notice! The two brothers can't get along, they fight and what happens next is the beginning of a nightmare. The viewer might think for a moment that is seeing a dream sequence or Todd's wishful thinking! Unfortunately everything is true and Todd and Cammie are following a path far more difficult that they can handle, especially Todd.

The movie has a few awkward moments and you aren't sure what to expect next. Malin Akerman gives a good performance as the determined woman-with-a-plan Cammie.

Overall: Recommended.

"Just one more thing and it's all over and we can do whatever we want with our lives." Todd (Labine) wants everything to be just perfect at the family cottage where he plans to propose to Cammie (Akerman). Things are going to plan until his brother and his girlfriend show up. After an attempt to get them to leave goes horribly wrong Todd's brother winds up dead. When Cammie finds out she has one solution, kill his girlfriend as well and no one will ever know. The plan is perfect until they return to the cabin and see a party happening...with guests invited by his brother. I was looking forward to this one mainly because the slasher- comedy movie Tucker and Dale vs Evil was so great I was hoping it would be like that. This did have funny parts in this but overall this wasn't nearly as funny as Tucker and Dale was. Much like that one though this is a very dark comedy and you laugh at things you shouldn't laugh at but the problem for me was that even though the actions were way over the top the actors seemed to play the movie straight. This little aspect made the movie lose some of the laughs that it could have gotten. Comparing this to Tucker and Dale isn't fair but that is the type of movie it is and is not as good as that one. Overall, disappointing but mainly because of my expectations. Not as funny as I was expecting. I give this a B-.

I adore Tyler Labine, so when I saw this movie on Amazon Prime, I decided to watch it without knowing much of anything about it. It was really surprising! As the story unfolds, things eventually go sideways in a way that I did not see coming.

If you know Macbeth, you can have a lot of fun seeing how the basic plot is lifted from that play. The ambitious woman drives her compliant mate to pursue the unthinkable, and having done so, both are haunted by the horror of their deeds. Mix in a little contemporary hilarity for the times, but you can't deny it's the Scottish play. It would have been cool to have read a few reviews that touched on this delightful parallel. It's like seeing 10 Things I Hate about You and finding a classic plot.

I had forgotten the name of the movie, and was searching "movies based on Macbeth" to no avail. I know there was the word cottage or cabin, but beyond that, couldn't think of a single actor's name or anything. Thanks IMDb for documenting everything!