They/Them: O Acampamento

I decided to watch this movie just because Kevin was in it, thought surely it must be good, Kevin is in it! ...It wasn't.

10 minutes in it was obvious who the killer was. Question was "why?"... and that wasn't revealed until later and it was so underwhelming.

Was hoping for some indiscriminate killing and people running around screaming for their lives, hiding, fearing... None of it. That's what I expected going into the movie...

Oh, dang it. That first two acts were really good. Why did they have to slash all those efforts with THAT finale?

I kept thinking, this would be a perfect double or triple feature with Red State and most definitely, But, I'm a Cheerleader. But, noooo, those are so much better. Watch those if you haven't seen them, or again if you have. This one...eh.

A group of youths attend a gay conversion camp and we get to know pretty much every character well and their struggles. Unfortunately, they're still at a gay conversion camp and yet, things are about to get a lot worse.

Let me backtrack a bit on my opinions above. I LOVED Kevin Bacon in this. In fact, I would go on record saying this is one of his best performances, start to finish. I even loved all the nods to Friday the 13th and some of his other movies I caught. And nicely enough, as much as I loved his acting and choices, this was much like his other movie I love so much, A Few Good Men: there were no bad actors or characters here.

ALL of the cast where great and I truly got invested in each. I was really digging the first and second acts as I got to know each individual, chemistry and charisma.

Also, I'm liking the trend of modern horror as the first half is solid character/story building, making us CARE for the characters. While this one followed that trend, it took it a little too far. This is supposed to be a slasher, but aside from the very few killer scenes sprinkled about, the movie doesn't kick it into high gear until the last 10-15 minutes. The slashing was such an incredibly small part of the first 75 (of 90) minutes, I started to believe it was just added on because Bacon starred in another camp-set, masked-killer film. In fact, by minute 75, I really just wanted to see a much longer movie exploring the villains developed in the first two acts.

And while I can appreciate the heart in the ending, including the monologue, but it just didn't fit. And it all felt so quickly and haphazardly thrown together. Even though there was only one writer, the third act HAD to be someone else's idea.

Sadly, I can't recommend this. If only they slashed the slasher aspects and just kept the heart of the story inside the character's bodies.

***

Final Thoughts: Oh, and I guessed way too easily who the killer was. Just an FYI, despite the grand number of slasher films I've seen and reviewed, I rarely ever guess the killer or ending. Truthfully, I'd rather NOT guess. I love to be surprised. This "twist" was absolutely not a surprise.

They/Them is a dissatisfying slasher that has interesting ideas, and a decent first half. But quickly divulges into a dull and uninspired slasher.

Starting off with the good, Kevin Bacon and Theo Germaine are very good with the material their given. Theo Germaine especially is a standout as this actor gives some surprising depth to their character. Speaking of depth all of these young kids actually have some character scenes that feel real. There's quite a bit of great emotional scenes between these characters which really made the film more grounded. And the first half of this film was actually somewhat decent. The physiological horror is actually done pretty well.

However despite some good ideas and good character moments, this film is a tonal mess from the last 30 minutes. The pacing is way too slow, in fact it's not really even a slasher for about 75 minutes. The movie builds to really nothing. It almost makes the slasher part of the film feel unnecessary, and almost a completely different film than the first half. The kills are very dull and uninventive, there's no creativity here. There's no tension or even any chase scenes. The movie falls back on a lot of horror clichés, and it made the final act very boring and disappointing. There's also some really bad editing in the final 20 minutes that make some scenes involving a certain character and the killer make no sense. And finally the killer was blatantly obvious. It's a terrible twist that you can see coming a mile away and really it makes you look back and see that none of our protagonist were in actual danger with the killer

Overall They/Them has an interesting premise, but doesn't do anything with that premise and offers no thrills, no blood, awful motivation, and a lack of scares.

My biggest problem with this movie is with how it was sold to me: A horror flick based at a Christian conversion camp. There was a couple of plot "twists" that weren't really twists, mainly because one of them made zero sense at all, and the other was completely predictable. I'm sure most reviewers will complain it was too progressive, but that didn't really bother me once I accepted what it wasn't: a horror movie. Once I got past that, then it was easy to be annoyed with what I was tricked by the trailer into watching: A crappy teen drama that was SUPER heavy-handed in character development and very little else. If I didn't know any better, I'd guess this was a pilot for a new teen drama about LGBTQ kids united by trauma at a Christian conversion camp on Peacock. They wouldn't even have to change the title.

They/Them gives us a somewhat interesting group of LGBTQ kids to pull for and then doesn't put them in any jeopardy whatsoever. Who are we supposed to be scared for? The homophobic camp counselors? It all comes to a head during the insulting ending which has me wanting to break my TV. Avoid at all costs!