The Cabin in the Woods (2012)
Directed by Joss Whedon
When you have seen as many horror movies as me, you see the same stories recycled either by imposters or remakes. Also you tend not to be surprised or taken by a twist. When I first saw The Cabin in the Woods, I thought it was another run of the mill slasher movie or even an Evil Dead ripoff. The movie ended up really surprising me, not only with the crazy story and the surprise ending, but because it was such a fresh idea and stray away from the found footage trash that was being spewed out by Hollywood at the time, and still.
Story of the movie, or as much as I will give away without ruining the film is that a group of college friends travel to a cabin in the woods that is owned by one of the friends’ cousin. Once they reach the cabin they realize something isn’t quite right and bizarre things start happening not only to them but within them. At the same time there are two guys in a bunker with numerous screens and controls that seem to be setting up what happens to the college kids.
The acting is pretty solid through out the film. Chris Hemsworth really shows some variety here as this is far from his work as Thor in the Avengers movies. Kristen Connolly plays the main character of Dana and she is cute and fun. We get the stereotypical stoner character named Marty (Fran Kranz), which seems to be the only character that notices something isn’t right initially and seems unfazed by the happenings. The rest of the characters are the blonde girl Jules (Ann Hutchinson), and the smart guy Holden (Jesse Williams). The two guys controlling the “game” are Gary (Richard Jenkins) and Steve (Bradley Whitford), whom I just call Mr. Doback and the guy with weird balls from Billy Madison. They play well of one another and bring some comedic aspects to the film.
The effects are pretty good, some of the CGI looks iffy but the gore and blood makes up for it. There are some fairly comical parts to this movie, especially Steve’s obsession with “the merman”, which has a great cameo later on. The film has little nods and homages to other famous horror films through out. Obviously the cabin is a nod to the Evil Dead and numerous items and people are nods to others. I really can’t explain too many of them without ruining the craziness that happens in the film later on.
The Cabin in the Woods is fun, creepy and funny. It is hard to find a movie that hits on all three of those aspects. Being surprised with a horror film is not something that I take lightly because it happens so rarely to me, this film is highly regarded with me and I really can’t give it anything less than an A-. While I appreciate its originality and surprise ending, there are a few things that could be improved. I felt like the character development really could have been a little better and the bad CGI kind of hinders my enjoyment in parts. As a whole it is a great idea that was executed very well. I would suggest you check it out.
