rachaelperson

The "drama" around this movie certainly created some buzz, but it didn't take long for it all to die down. Why? Because the movie's not very good. The real shame is that it's not terrible, which would've been more entertaining. Instead, it's just bad, and thereby boring.

Florence Pugh saves this from being completely without merit. She's good in just about everything she does, so that shouldn't come as a shock. Chris Pine also does a fine job. Harry Styles, though...ooh boy. I'd keep this one off the résumé, 'cause this is not a good performance.

Visually, the movie is fine. Nothing to write home about, but it's not an eyesore, so there's that. The story is just hardly interesting enough to want to know where it'll end up - I say hardly because by the time things were being explained, I really didn't care anymore. And my word, the big reveal. That might be the only part of this movie that is actually entertaining, and it's because it's truly awful. They're obviously trying to make a point about gender inequality, which I'm all for, but they failed.

What people have been saying is right, in a sense: this is an above-average mainstream horror movie. The problem is that the average mainstream horror movie is atrociously bad, so yeah, this is better, but it's not great.

To be fair, I don't think this is a "bad" movie; it's just not much better than okay. I can say it's shot pretty well. The music is good at points. Other things, though, can vary. The performances ranged drastically in quality, with some great and some terrible. The lead actress does a serviceable job for the most part, although there are some points where she's not quite convincing. The story itself isn't all that original: if you've seen a transferable curse movie before (The Ring, The Grudge, It Follows), you know exactly how this will play out.

The real shame is that there are flashes of greatness buried in all the mediocrity.

*MILD SPOILER* The monster design was (as far as I can tell) done practically and looked great. There are scenes that have some really interesting ideas. Unfortunately, there are also scenes like the birthday party, which, for me, was unintentionally hilarious.

All in all, yes, this is a watchable movie, but not nearly as good as the hype I've seen around it.

If this is what we can expect from Alan Resnick in the future, then I want more. With a relatively small budget, he's made a genuinely impressive short. (I'm aware there's a website tie-in to this, but I didn't look into it, so I won't comment on it other than saying it exists.) First of all, this short is greatly helped by the way it was broadcast. Seeing this at 3 a.m. Is definitely (probably) the best way to experience this. Sadly, I didn't. What makes me say this in the first place is the weird, lucid dream feel that Resnick creates. This lends to a lot of comedy and horror, and it's balanced better than in a lot of mainstream horror-comedy efforts. Certain shots are burned into my memory, not because they're "terrifying," but because they're so unique. There were plenty of points throughout the short that I just thought to myself, "This is awesome." If Resnick had a budget for a feature, I really hope he'd be able to do something that's up to this quality. So to all producers out there: PLEASE give this man more money, he is a treasure.