31 Days of Halloween Films #3: The Cabin in the Woods
The Lowdown: There’s this cabin, in the woods, and a bunch of teenagers go to it. Also a unicorn may or may not impale a guy.
The Breakdown (Gigantic, Mamma Jamma Spoilers! Seriously.): Well, leave it to the man who successfully directed and wrote The Avengers to completely dismantle the horror genre. Originally shelved for over a year due to studios not understanding how to market it, The Cabin in the Woods was just the kick in the pants modern horror needed. Whedon walks a tightrope between the scares and the camp, delivering what might be the most unique horror-comedy of the past decade. By sending up films like The Wicker Man, The Evil Dead and Romero’s zombie films, TCITW goes places other horror flicks had not been able to before. Sure, the gore is light and the actual horror is always played for laughs, but the flick basically holds up a mirror to every other film in the genre and says “show me what you got”.
Cabin brilliantly sets up your classic slasher/horror scenario from square one. You’re introduced to the main characters, as they travel to the aforementioned shack, consisting of a stoner, a jock, a medical student, a HUGE whore and a seemingly naive girl. All of the characters play into their given stereotype, at first, making the first act all of what you have seen before, save for one subplot involving Richard Jenkins and Bradley Whitford. As a couple of clerical workers/technicians in a lab somewhere, Jenkins and Whitford add a ton of comic relief and, more importantly, the structure for which the rest of the film uses to turn the tables on itself and become something wholly different than the trailers might have led you to believe.
WARNING: At this point it is impossible for me to not spoil the FUCK out of this movie, so proceed at your own risk!
Any horror fan worth his/her salt could appreciate where the film goes from here. Without missing a beat, the plot opens up and we learn the “technicians” are controlling the goings on at the cabin, having an effect on our five main characters and even having some sort of power over the zombies attacking them. Soon after, our main characters start getting offed, leading to the survivors discovering they are being manipulated by something they can’t quite understand. From here on out it’s batshit insanity. Through an ingenious plot device, we get an absolute slaughter from every horror movie monster you could think of, of course altered slightly as to not violate copyright. Chances are if you’re afraid of anything, it probably shows up in the third act to terrorize the survivors. The best way I could describe all the mayhem is that it feels like a funhouse ride that you never want to end. We even get a solid cameo from Sigourney Weaver to help wrap the plot up.
The Comedown: Now as far as endings go, TCITW does not stick the landing. The rest of the film, admittedly, is pretty wonderful, packed with references to every piece of classic horror you can think of. It is this admiration for the genre that bails out the movies’ overall cop-out of an ending, ensuring that when it happens you really do not mind. With a strong cast, even stronger writing, self referential comedy and some solid horror sequences, The Cabin in the Woods is a fantastic horror-comedy to ease you into October, combining the terror of the holiday along with the arguably-more-important fun that it can be.