Cabin in the Woods
Just as I felt that Joss Whedon could do no wrong… I watched Cabin in the Woods…. And realised…. Yes in fact this man at this stage in his career.. can do no wrong.
This movie was incredibly lucky to get out. There was a claim that it was “sat on a shelf” gathering dust etc.. but actually what happened was it was a MGM backed venture… and MGM went bankrupt.. so there was no distributor for the movie until Lionsgate bought up all the various MGM stock. Delivered to our screens at the odd time of “April”… rather than Halloween this was one of those movies that was basically put in the cinemas because it had to make some money.. without any real publicity beyond it having Thor’s Chris Hemsworth in it and eventually being picked up as being by “than guy who directed that awesome smash hit called The Avengers/Marvels Avengers/ Avengers Assemble……..
Advertising was quite lax, and to my mind appealed to half a wrong audience (but that’s really no surprise), it implied this was a what Lions gate should have been doing was going “LOOK… the buffy dudes have made an awesome horror flick… come see this”. But I think word of mouth did for this movie quite well.
Directed by Drew Goddard(who incidentally wrote Cloverfield…. Now that would have been an awesome movie if done by this collaborative pair.. and maybe it wouldn’t be in nauseating shakey vision).. Written by Drew Goddard and Joss Whedon. Joss doing some of the second unit work.
Staring: many many people from whedonverse past and future
Yes I will get on with my chatter but. Firstly Watch Cabin in the Woods. Unless you really can’t do gore and have never seen any previous horror movies.. in which case… CitW may not be for you. As you probably won’t be able to watch much and what you do see… you won’t understand because you won’t have seen the referencing film.. so won’t be relevant or funny…in the funny bits.
Secondly If you have not seen Cabin in the Woods and want to watch it unspoiled DO NOT READ UNDER THE CUT… I will be discussing various nuances of the movie in detail and they will epically spoiler you which you don’t want.. Because this is one of those movies where half the fun is peeling the onion that is this movie’s storyline.
oh yeah I also spoiler, the Cube as well..
Okay..
Right…
The Plot: How to describe the plot… well I could actually do this in one sentence.. that sentence being
Faceless corporation lures groups of teens into Horror scenario ritual to placate great old gods and appease them into not bringing about an apocalypse. But this is an drastic drastic over simplification of what is happening. So even knowing this.. you don’t know the full situation.
The movie itself starts in a place you wouldn’t actually expect it to If you hadn’t read the above over simplification of the story.. In a grey corporate control centre “somewhere”. where lots and lots of dialogue is delivered by Hadley (Bradley Whitford) and Sitterson (Richard Jenkins) and “prep activity” going on involving many actors you may recognise from the recently (at the time) defunct Stargate franchises and Whedonverse) - (I will be here all day if I list them)… anyway you follow this hive of activity and such, all of which sort of leaves you partially wondering if we are going to have an “alien” situation occur or maybe some sort of “it’s an escaped experiment” horror, which is sort of confusing because you signed on for … funnily enough… a cabin in the woods… you know.. the whole American idea of explaining the plot in a cunningly worded title…. You know. You watch Texas Chainsaw Massacre because you want to see.. a massacre by someone with a chainsaw.. quite likely in Texas… But just to make sure you having wandered off into your brain, or lost interest and fallen asleep or just had your eyes cross as your brain shuts down and to ensure you will be paying attention in the next 20 minutes at least. There comes one of the most awesome Boo gags I have ever encountered… the juxtaposition of two office suits having a random mundane conversation book ended by a sudden and epically dramatic (but plain texted) title of the movie just floored me.. I am afraid it’s an aesthetic thing either it makes you jump and you laugh from nerves or you do like me get hit full in the face by the comedy of a boring conversation about house hold DIY appliances being ended by EPIC TITLES.. Which are plain and visually boring… not dripping with blood in italic gothic or even wobbling around like you usually get… Just plain text - though in red. It was such a surprise and struck me a so funny I laughed for a whole 60 seconds before I realised I had to shut up or I would miss useful dialogue.
I do begin to suspect that Joss could script an entire 30 minutes of office workers in an office working and a: make it watchable and b: make you wish you were working in that office.
I digress. Yes so after the little pre-amble which kinda, leaves you (well it left me mentally running the list ) listing a million possible genre tropes.. you get to the Basic plot arrival… Seriously the whole scene you could probably recite with your eyes closed and your back to the screen, what is happening in the scene. It’s the basic start of any Teenage American horror flick - movie blurb, five American lateteenysomethings decide to go off somewhere and have a holiday.
In this case our lateteenysomethings are Dana (Kristen Connolly) the plucky red head mousy type, Curt (Chris Hemsworth) the tall athletic looking one, Jules (Anna Hutchinson) - the now blonde cheerleader looking type, Holden (Jesse Williams) the bookish one and Marty(Fran Kranz) the comedy slacker one. (It is very important here to listen to the conversations that these people have.. they are not your usual vacuous air head horror fodder, even the stoner slacker is intelligent - when he’s not so chilled he’s practically horrizontal).
So they and tool up and head out in their little Winniebago thing into the middle of nowhere forresty bit of the country… to a place that they only know of through word of mouth from Curt’s cousin…. What they don’t see but we do is the guy on the roof of their house with earpiece watching them leave…
The important point to note at this point in the movie is that you “the viewer” are being placed into a rare position. Which is unusual in a generic horror movie. You the “Voyeur” are being allowed to see simultaneously what is going on with the protagonists.. and you are seeing the guiding hand behind the protagonists predicament. It’s like watching the end of the Cube and the beginning of the Cube at the same time. which if you start to think about it gives you a sort of uncomfortable moment of existential uncertainty because you can’t slip into that ‘comfy zone’ of knowing what’s going happen next.. because the act of observing a thing changes the thing.. you can’t be certain that because you can see the people running the show then they have the ability to change the scenario… which is seriously destabilising to your visual comfort zone.. immediately putting you on edge, Which is actually quite refreshing because it breathes new life into the running of the tropes.
But back to the action..
So, the protagonists drive for through a montage of trees, pass through the ordeal by freaky mad redneck filling station owner warning them “…don’t go onto the moors!”.. oh yeah sorry this is American horror movie.. he blathers redneck bible bashing insults and is suitably foreboding.. which the ‘kids’ take umbrage at and ignore…. And so end up at their final destination.. (with an important “chance view” of the unfortunate demise of an eagle to give you an idea that “something is not exactly right”, in the “something’s not quite right area”). Although to be honest the eponymous Cabin… is exactly the same as any of the ‘Cabins’.ever used in any of the horror movies you have ever watched… (which immediately proves these guys have never seen any horror movie in their lives, because if it were me.. the place would be in flames and I would be high tailing out of there as fuel economical driving could get me)
Cue much activity in the “bunker/control centre” as the staff hold a sweepstake. And if you are paying attention you can figure out why the “something is not exactly right”, in the “something’s not quite right area”
At this point you the voyeur are moved completely beyond the 4th wall and you “know” what’s happening, this is a massive trap and the ‘kids’ are there to unwittingly take part in a Death by horror trope scenario.
The point being the cellar of the cabin contains practically every trigger condition you can think of from every horror movie you can think of..
Reels of 8 mil movie film
Blank doll face masks
Dolls houses
Dolls
Mysterious books.
Random foreboding jewellery
Strange puzzle devices.
Musical instruments
Etc.
(if you want some fun then freeze frame the scene and see how many movies you can spot being referenced.)
In this case their choice is that “they read aloud from the BOOK!”…
Like I said.. they should have burned he cabin down, turned round and gone home.. (Knights of the Dinner Table had it right.. touch nothing, burn everything talk to no one:..)
Cue a short blast on the standard horror trope of relentless deliverance driven zombies who must kill everyone in as pain fully gruesome way as they are able. Plus boobies, blood, hideous screaming death, head throwing and systematic picking off of others. But with the difference beign that you can see the control centre engineer the scenario so that the ‘kid’s will die… specifically, often painfully and in a specific order…
The revelation of the “something is not quite right with the something is not quite right scenario” being that victims are in some sort of giant sacrificial ritual. Involving them dying ins a specific order, in torment … these kids have been chosen, groomed and pushed into the situation they are in to be gribbled by a horror of their unwitting choice so that the agenda of the faceless control centre can be fulfilled.
The kids all die, the last kid is about to meet her horrible and terrifying end, the control room is celebrating a job well done, the big screens showing the last kid being literally beaten to death by the zombies….. when.. it all stops… a phone rings….. They are in deep trouble…
In classic Horror movie style… they made the ultimate mistake.. they took their eye of the situation and didn’t see the body. One of the kids survived. Marty turned the tables on his would be killer and won. And the faceless group are now worried. Because the last survivor is the “virgin”, the ingénue, she/he has to be last.. they don’t necessarily have to die but they have to be last. If Marty dies first then the ritual is broken and the Gods are not appeased.
Cue panic.
And so the horror movie switches POV. We are no longer a “kids vs supernatural horror” its now “kids vs faceless corporate agenda” (which I feel myself is far more horrific).
Marty after surviving and being left alone has found the back door into the complex. And the two of them venture in…Finding.. the Menagerie. And the control room for the menagerie… where they proceed to do what I would do.. which is press every button I could find.. releasing the collection into the complex… and lining up a rolling event of epic chaotic horrific nasty death for the “faceless corporate workers” in the complex… Lots of chaos.. lots of gore.. lots of really funny but grim death. Just desserts being dealt out left right and centre to the various staff memebrs(I really need to watch the whole thing again and see if the various departments actually do get gribbled by their sweepstake horror… it would be poetic if it did).
Our two kids managed to survive the chaos and find “the Vault”.. an evenmore sunteranian room containing five plaques, depicting, the whore/slut, the athlete, the joker, the scholar and the virgin. And “The Director” (Sigourney Weaver) - in faceless beige suit and black gloves (Whedon really has a thing about not being able to see the hands…)
The Director proceeds to explain the scenario and teh kids role in teh scenario. As mentioned previously “the old gods” from before our time are sleeping below. To keep them appeased and happy 5 or more people must be drawn into the designate ritual and die.
The Whore = Jules
The Joker = Marty
The Athlete = Curt
The Scholar = Holden
these can die in any order really as long as the Virgin = Dana is the last person, and they don't need to neccesarily die they have to just suffer through the whole experience of th ehorror and the deaths of the others.. The virgin may then survive or not, that is unimportant in the grand scheme. As long as they suffer through the deaths of their friends everythging else is just gravy.
There are other centres around the world, each doing the same thing (with their particular regional variations - (e.g in Japan its 9 year old school kids in their classroom with a floating malevolent Ghost)so far though this year, the problem is that all the other rituals have failed, in that the "victims" figured out how to thwart the tropes and survived or possibly didn't die in the correct order. This means that the american scenario is the last chance. If this ritual fails then it all goes to hell in a very literal sense. The old gods will awaken and destroy the established world.
what this means is Dana must kill Marty or at least allow Marty to be killed.
Needless to say.. the decision when you boil down to it, is not a easy as it might seem.
I have to say that in the long term I am not a Horror Genre fan. Mainly because I don't like gor much or graphic violence for the sake of violence. I also have an issue where if I find something is implausible to the point where I fall out of my suspension of disbelief then I can't watch the movie. I also find that if a character is just plain stupid then I fall into the "Why don't you just die" mode. But this movie goes out of its way to provide a perfectly valid reason WHY the peopel are acting the way they are acting... the reason why they suddenly become a stupid blonde cheerleader archetype, why the gang split up, why after killing the antagonist, even with more antagonists around they drop the one pointy weapon in the room... and why it is that teh bridge coveniently burns down, or the tunnel suddenly experiences a catastrophic structural faliure.
It explains why they go outside in the dark in the middle of nowhere and
most of all why they went there in the first place.. because they were chosen from the herd. The faceless group engineered usign its fabulous resources, psychologists and corporate machine, found them, groomed them, enveigled them and then released them into the kill zone. Which pretty much works for me as a valid reason for any of the horro scenarios in all of the stock movies.. the reason the victims are so stupid and faithfully do stupid things is because they are being drugged, controlled through suggestion and their environment is rigged for them to loose. This scenario could quite easily be re-purposed into a really expensive snuff encounter for very rich people to watch which woudl be just as plausable as "greater old gods". but posisbly be far more disturbing fro an american audience than "we are doing if for the greater good"
I have to say that I liked this movie. I really really like this movie. I like it because it has things on a level for anyone.. If you want to watch it as a genre horror movie, then its got that, but if you want to read into the various levels then you can do that as well.
Whedon has this habit of starting with a seemingly innocent premise then taking you on a journey through your morality to the other side and letting you see where you land.
In this case this movie apeals to my perception of what horror should be. I have the opinion that horror is something which leaves you with a feeling of horror and if possible make you feel a chill when you think back on it. They aren't horrific because buckets of fake bloowd and pig intestines are sprayed accross the screen... Zombies going errg! and then killing someone by pulling their head off.. thats bad.. but the victim invariably is dead at this point.. so it's but really just messy execution. It's like watching a nature program on tv - 'and here is the zombie in it's natural environment.. as you can see it sees its prey.. alone done the empty streets the lone human knows nothign of it's ulimate fate...."
Horror is the guy who has his intestines pulled out and eaten in front of him while he's still alove and screaming (but this invariable does not last long, so is not as horrfic as it could be). Horror is being incarcerated forever in a stone body, unable to speak but fully concious and able to feel. Horror is being locked in a room alive and knowing that a "Dr Mengele" achetype is in control. Or even watching hungry witches saw off the leg of an incarcerated were-wolf, with no anesthetic, becuase they know it will grow back and they will have an endless supply of meat that way. The film the necronomicon has a wonderful scene where a young lady wakes up in a hospital bed, a multiple amputee from a "accident" and then gets to watch lovcraftian monster suck the marrow from her amputated limbs.... that had me in shivers for weeks. Horo is believing this could and possibly is happening.
CitW does this by pulling in the trope of the faceless organisation getting normal people to do bad things for a perceived “greater good”. That it will get people to leave their moral and ethical code in the cloakroom with their coats at 8.30am and pick it up again at 5pm. Doing things that it has been proven that humans will do if given the license to do so (see the Milgram Study (1974) and the Stanford Prison Experiment (1971))
It wasn’t lost on me that Hadley and Sitterson use the argument “They have to make the choice of their own free will. Otherwise, system doesn't work. Like the harbinger: creepy old fuck practically wears a sign saying "YOU WILL DIE". Why would we put him there? The system. They have to choose to ignore him. They have to choose what happens in the cellar. yeah, we write the game as much as we have to but in the end, if they don't transgress they can't be punished.”
The implication being that the kids chose to die…(a claim by the way a number of serial killers use to justify them killing their victims) - also playing on the horror movie trope of “Too stupid to live.” - which only works because we the voyeur (sorry viewer) know the “rules” and the kids in the scenario don’t, mainly, usually because they are purposefully written as having never seen a horror genre movie in their life and they don’t know that they are in that exact scenario…
In this individual case though the claim that those kids had any sort of free will is erroneous.. because the faceless group have engineered them into the con, they have drugged them, they have coerced them, they have purposefully not told them the whole truth and in some cases just enveigled them into the position they are in. A fact which you as the viewer are quite happy with because you just drop the kids into teh "too stupid to live" box and gleefully await their demise caused by their enforced ignorance. but its their fault for being stupid.
If this movie were the same as “Scream” where they list and mock the genre tropes. then yes the kids have mocked the fates and so must accept the consequence. In that movie the kids knew the score.. if they didn’t at the first death, then they did by the second death, they knew that there was a killer using horror tropes as a modus operandi and so could have worked against type to "win"..
But in this movie the kids don’t know this, nor do they appear to have any idea about any particular horror tropes. So the idea they can disengage from the process is ludicrous, because they don't know they are in that situation. and its even more ludicrous a thought when you realise that the Faceless organisation has everything stacked in the other direction. All their resources are geered up to get those kids killed. It is never more clearly expressed in the movie as when ever the kids have a "good" idea on a course of action which wil bypass a particular trope e.g. Marty pointing out that reading aloud from the book may be a bad idea, or Curt suggesting that they stay together and/or work as a team. The faceless group turns on the psychology and the drugs to keep them on course and fully compliant with the "story". Its like saying the mouse has the choice not to run through the maze.
As is prevalent in many a Whedon storylines, the over arching theme seems to be based on the idea that humanity rests itself on the shoulders of the individual but that a faceless group of people begin to dictate the actions of the individuals in the name of "the greater good". And by doing this the faceless organisation becomes corupted by its own dogma, and sinks into a base arrogance of believing that it has the right to choose which individuals live or die because.. it can. It has great power and no responsibility. It's a theme which echos through buffy, through firefly through dollhouse.. and the other movies and stories Whedon has a hand in.
I will say for defiante that I don't claim this is a perfect movie. but it is a good movie. it has a strong storline, good actors delivering an excellent performance. Infact all the actors are good from the leads right through to the background staff. Drew Goddard and Joswhedon apear to have been an very successful collaboration. I can only wonder what Cloverfield would have been like had these two worked on it.. but hey ho.
There are a few things that jumped out at me as a bit off. I found the bear trap grabber thing the lead zombie used was just wrong. I realise that it coudl be the embodyment of the trope of "hugely impractical signature weapon” but i just could help but think that it was a stupid and impractical weapon. Spring traps are designed to grab onto sticky out parts of the body, so limbs, possibly head not grab onto expanses of flat flesh. For it to “grab” the back of a human and gain purchase, it would need to have teeth that could lock in and if it had those the spring would be so strong it would just rake through the flesh. It woudl have been more believable if it had either been swung to grab then on the side or if it had locked onto the torso by smashing ribs/spine.. of course leaving the victim immobile and screaming. Which i am guessing was just too horrific, or looked stupid or something. Either way I hated that thing and found it visually just pissed me off.
I was having a few issues with the use of the two person lumberjack saw. But luckily it only gets utilised twice in the movie and the first time it is used its used quite well. It’s the second time that I went “wait a minute!”… but the movie moves swiftly on and so you can just forget about it.
otherwise I can live with this movie quite happily.
When I look at it though.. I came out of the movie wanting to see it again.. which I feel is always a good sign of an enjoyable and engaging experience.
I will be buying the blu-ray of this one (once they produce blu’s that won’t stall your blu-ray player because of an inherent flaw in the encoding…) I very much want this movie to own..
Please watch this movie if you can and enjoy it..
Its worth reading here for a good discussion on the various tropes. But don't go there until you see the movie.
http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Film/TheCabinInTheWoods
This movie was incredibly lucky to get out. There was a claim that it was “sat on a shelf” gathering dust etc.. but actually what happened was it was a MGM backed venture… and MGM went bankrupt.. so there was no distributor for the movie until Lionsgate bought up all the various MGM stock. Delivered to our screens at the odd time of “April”… rather than Halloween this was one of those movies that was basically put in the cinemas because it had to make some money.. without any real publicity beyond it having Thor’s Chris Hemsworth in it and eventually being picked up as being by “than guy who directed that awesome smash hit called The Avengers/Marvels Avengers/ Avengers Assemble……..
Advertising was quite lax, and to my mind appealed to half a wrong audience (but that’s really no surprise), it implied this was a what Lions gate should have been doing was going “LOOK… the buffy dudes have made an awesome horror flick… come see this”. But I think word of mouth did for this movie quite well.
Directed by Drew Goddard(who incidentally wrote Cloverfield…. Now that would have been an awesome movie if done by this collaborative pair.. and maybe it wouldn’t be in nauseating shakey vision).. Written by Drew Goddard and Joss Whedon. Joss doing some of the second unit work.
Staring: many many people from whedonverse past and future
Yes I will get on with my chatter but. Firstly Watch Cabin in the Woods. Unless you really can’t do gore and have never seen any previous horror movies.. in which case… CitW may not be for you. As you probably won’t be able to watch much and what you do see… you won’t understand because you won’t have seen the referencing film.. so won’t be relevant or funny…in the funny bits.
Secondly If you have not seen Cabin in the Woods and want to watch it unspoiled DO NOT READ UNDER THE CUT… I will be discussing various nuances of the movie in detail and they will epically spoiler you which you don’t want.. Because this is one of those movies where half the fun is peeling the onion that is this movie’s storyline.
oh yeah I also spoiler, the Cube as well..
Okay..
Right…
The Plot: How to describe the plot… well I could actually do this in one sentence.. that sentence being
Faceless corporation lures groups of teens into Horror scenario ritual to placate great old gods and appease them into not bringing about an apocalypse. But this is an drastic drastic over simplification of what is happening. So even knowing this.. you don’t know the full situation.
The movie itself starts in a place you wouldn’t actually expect it to If you hadn’t read the above over simplification of the story.. In a grey corporate control centre “somewhere”. where lots and lots of dialogue is delivered by Hadley (Bradley Whitford) and Sitterson (Richard Jenkins) and “prep activity” going on involving many actors you may recognise from the recently (at the time) defunct Stargate franchises and Whedonverse) - (I will be here all day if I list them)… anyway you follow this hive of activity and such, all of which sort of leaves you partially wondering if we are going to have an “alien” situation occur or maybe some sort of “it’s an escaped experiment” horror, which is sort of confusing because you signed on for … funnily enough… a cabin in the woods… you know.. the whole American idea of explaining the plot in a cunningly worded title…. You know. You watch Texas Chainsaw Massacre because you want to see.. a massacre by someone with a chainsaw.. quite likely in Texas… But just to make sure you having wandered off into your brain, or lost interest and fallen asleep or just had your eyes cross as your brain shuts down and to ensure you will be paying attention in the next 20 minutes at least. There comes one of the most awesome Boo gags I have ever encountered… the juxtaposition of two office suits having a random mundane conversation book ended by a sudden and epically dramatic (but plain texted) title of the movie just floored me.. I am afraid it’s an aesthetic thing either it makes you jump and you laugh from nerves or you do like me get hit full in the face by the comedy of a boring conversation about house hold DIY appliances being ended by EPIC TITLES.. Which are plain and visually boring… not dripping with blood in italic gothic or even wobbling around like you usually get… Just plain text - though in red. It was such a surprise and struck me a so funny I laughed for a whole 60 seconds before I realised I had to shut up or I would miss useful dialogue.
I do begin to suspect that Joss could script an entire 30 minutes of office workers in an office working and a: make it watchable and b: make you wish you were working in that office.
I digress. Yes so after the little pre-amble which kinda, leaves you (well it left me mentally running the list ) listing a million possible genre tropes.. you get to the Basic plot arrival… Seriously the whole scene you could probably recite with your eyes closed and your back to the screen, what is happening in the scene. It’s the basic start of any Teenage American horror flick - movie blurb, five American lateteenysomethings decide to go off somewhere and have a holiday.
In this case our lateteenysomethings are Dana (Kristen Connolly) the plucky red head mousy type, Curt (Chris Hemsworth) the tall athletic looking one, Jules (Anna Hutchinson) - the now blonde cheerleader looking type, Holden (Jesse Williams) the bookish one and Marty(Fran Kranz) the comedy slacker one. (It is very important here to listen to the conversations that these people have.. they are not your usual vacuous air head horror fodder, even the stoner slacker is intelligent - when he’s not so chilled he’s practically horrizontal).
So they and tool up and head out in their little Winniebago thing into the middle of nowhere forresty bit of the country… to a place that they only know of through word of mouth from Curt’s cousin…. What they don’t see but we do is the guy on the roof of their house with earpiece watching them leave…
The important point to note at this point in the movie is that you “the viewer” are being placed into a rare position. Which is unusual in a generic horror movie. You the “Voyeur” are being allowed to see simultaneously what is going on with the protagonists.. and you are seeing the guiding hand behind the protagonists predicament. It’s like watching the end of the Cube and the beginning of the Cube at the same time. which if you start to think about it gives you a sort of uncomfortable moment of existential uncertainty because you can’t slip into that ‘comfy zone’ of knowing what’s going happen next.. because the act of observing a thing changes the thing.. you can’t be certain that because you can see the people running the show then they have the ability to change the scenario… which is seriously destabilising to your visual comfort zone.. immediately putting you on edge, Which is actually quite refreshing because it breathes new life into the running of the tropes.
But back to the action..
So, the protagonists drive for through a montage of trees, pass through the ordeal by freaky mad redneck filling station owner warning them “…don’t go onto the moors!”.. oh yeah sorry this is American horror movie.. he blathers redneck bible bashing insults and is suitably foreboding.. which the ‘kids’ take umbrage at and ignore…. And so end up at their final destination.. (with an important “chance view” of the unfortunate demise of an eagle to give you an idea that “something is not exactly right”, in the “something’s not quite right area”). Although to be honest the eponymous Cabin… is exactly the same as any of the ‘Cabins’.ever used in any of the horror movies you have ever watched… (which immediately proves these guys have never seen any horror movie in their lives, because if it were me.. the place would be in flames and I would be high tailing out of there as fuel economical driving could get me)
Cue much activity in the “bunker/control centre” as the staff hold a sweepstake. And if you are paying attention you can figure out why the “something is not exactly right”, in the “something’s not quite right area”
At this point you the voyeur are moved completely beyond the 4th wall and you “know” what’s happening, this is a massive trap and the ‘kids’ are there to unwittingly take part in a Death by horror trope scenario.
The point being the cellar of the cabin contains practically every trigger condition you can think of from every horror movie you can think of..
Reels of 8 mil movie film
Blank doll face masks
Dolls houses
Dolls
Mysterious books.
Random foreboding jewellery
Strange puzzle devices.
Musical instruments
Etc.
(if you want some fun then freeze frame the scene and see how many movies you can spot being referenced.)
In this case their choice is that “they read aloud from the BOOK!”…
Like I said.. they should have burned he cabin down, turned round and gone home.. (Knights of the Dinner Table had it right.. touch nothing, burn everything talk to no one:..)
Cue a short blast on the standard horror trope of relentless deliverance driven zombies who must kill everyone in as pain fully gruesome way as they are able. Plus boobies, blood, hideous screaming death, head throwing and systematic picking off of others. But with the difference beign that you can see the control centre engineer the scenario so that the ‘kid’s will die… specifically, often painfully and in a specific order…
The revelation of the “something is not quite right with the something is not quite right scenario” being that victims are in some sort of giant sacrificial ritual. Involving them dying ins a specific order, in torment … these kids have been chosen, groomed and pushed into the situation they are in to be gribbled by a horror of their unwitting choice so that the agenda of the faceless control centre can be fulfilled.
The kids all die, the last kid is about to meet her horrible and terrifying end, the control room is celebrating a job well done, the big screens showing the last kid being literally beaten to death by the zombies….. when.. it all stops… a phone rings….. They are in deep trouble…
In classic Horror movie style… they made the ultimate mistake.. they took their eye of the situation and didn’t see the body. One of the kids survived. Marty turned the tables on his would be killer and won. And the faceless group are now worried. Because the last survivor is the “virgin”, the ingénue, she/he has to be last.. they don’t necessarily have to die but they have to be last. If Marty dies first then the ritual is broken and the Gods are not appeased.
Cue panic.
And so the horror movie switches POV. We are no longer a “kids vs supernatural horror” its now “kids vs faceless corporate agenda” (which I feel myself is far more horrific).
Marty after surviving and being left alone has found the back door into the complex. And the two of them venture in…Finding.. the Menagerie. And the control room for the menagerie… where they proceed to do what I would do.. which is press every button I could find.. releasing the collection into the complex… and lining up a rolling event of epic chaotic horrific nasty death for the “faceless corporate workers” in the complex… Lots of chaos.. lots of gore.. lots of really funny but grim death. Just desserts being dealt out left right and centre to the various staff memebrs(I really need to watch the whole thing again and see if the various departments actually do get gribbled by their sweepstake horror… it would be poetic if it did).
Our two kids managed to survive the chaos and find “the Vault”.. an evenmore sunteranian room containing five plaques, depicting, the whore/slut, the athlete, the joker, the scholar and the virgin. And “The Director” (Sigourney Weaver) - in faceless beige suit and black gloves (Whedon really has a thing about not being able to see the hands…)
The Director proceeds to explain the scenario and teh kids role in teh scenario. As mentioned previously “the old gods” from before our time are sleeping below. To keep them appeased and happy 5 or more people must be drawn into the designate ritual and die.
The Whore = Jules
The Joker = Marty
The Athlete = Curt
The Scholar = Holden
these can die in any order really as long as the Virgin = Dana is the last person, and they don't need to neccesarily die they have to just suffer through the whole experience of th ehorror and the deaths of the others.. The virgin may then survive or not, that is unimportant in the grand scheme. As long as they suffer through the deaths of their friends everythging else is just gravy.
There are other centres around the world, each doing the same thing (with their particular regional variations - (e.g in Japan its 9 year old school kids in their classroom with a floating malevolent Ghost)so far though this year, the problem is that all the other rituals have failed, in that the "victims" figured out how to thwart the tropes and survived or possibly didn't die in the correct order. This means that the american scenario is the last chance. If this ritual fails then it all goes to hell in a very literal sense. The old gods will awaken and destroy the established world.
what this means is Dana must kill Marty or at least allow Marty to be killed.
Needless to say.. the decision when you boil down to it, is not a easy as it might seem.
I have to say that in the long term I am not a Horror Genre fan. Mainly because I don't like gor much or graphic violence for the sake of violence. I also have an issue where if I find something is implausible to the point where I fall out of my suspension of disbelief then I can't watch the movie. I also find that if a character is just plain stupid then I fall into the "Why don't you just die" mode. But this movie goes out of its way to provide a perfectly valid reason WHY the peopel are acting the way they are acting... the reason why they suddenly become a stupid blonde cheerleader archetype, why the gang split up, why after killing the antagonist, even with more antagonists around they drop the one pointy weapon in the room... and why it is that teh bridge coveniently burns down, or the tunnel suddenly experiences a catastrophic structural faliure.
It explains why they go outside in the dark in the middle of nowhere and
most of all why they went there in the first place.. because they were chosen from the herd. The faceless group engineered usign its fabulous resources, psychologists and corporate machine, found them, groomed them, enveigled them and then released them into the kill zone. Which pretty much works for me as a valid reason for any of the horro scenarios in all of the stock movies.. the reason the victims are so stupid and faithfully do stupid things is because they are being drugged, controlled through suggestion and their environment is rigged for them to loose. This scenario could quite easily be re-purposed into a really expensive snuff encounter for very rich people to watch which woudl be just as plausable as "greater old gods". but posisbly be far more disturbing fro an american audience than "we are doing if for the greater good"
I have to say that I liked this movie. I really really like this movie. I like it because it has things on a level for anyone.. If you want to watch it as a genre horror movie, then its got that, but if you want to read into the various levels then you can do that as well.
Whedon has this habit of starting with a seemingly innocent premise then taking you on a journey through your morality to the other side and letting you see where you land.
In this case this movie apeals to my perception of what horror should be. I have the opinion that horror is something which leaves you with a feeling of horror and if possible make you feel a chill when you think back on it. They aren't horrific because buckets of fake bloowd and pig intestines are sprayed accross the screen... Zombies going errg! and then killing someone by pulling their head off.. thats bad.. but the victim invariably is dead at this point.. so it's but really just messy execution. It's like watching a nature program on tv - 'and here is the zombie in it's natural environment.. as you can see it sees its prey.. alone done the empty streets the lone human knows nothign of it's ulimate fate...."
Horror is the guy who has his intestines pulled out and eaten in front of him while he's still alove and screaming (but this invariable does not last long, so is not as horrfic as it could be). Horror is being incarcerated forever in a stone body, unable to speak but fully concious and able to feel. Horror is being locked in a room alive and knowing that a "Dr Mengele" achetype is in control. Or even watching hungry witches saw off the leg of an incarcerated were-wolf, with no anesthetic, becuase they know it will grow back and they will have an endless supply of meat that way. The film the necronomicon has a wonderful scene where a young lady wakes up in a hospital bed, a multiple amputee from a "accident" and then gets to watch lovcraftian monster suck the marrow from her amputated limbs.... that had me in shivers for weeks. Horo is believing this could and possibly is happening.
CitW does this by pulling in the trope of the faceless organisation getting normal people to do bad things for a perceived “greater good”. That it will get people to leave their moral and ethical code in the cloakroom with their coats at 8.30am and pick it up again at 5pm. Doing things that it has been proven that humans will do if given the license to do so (see the Milgram Study (1974) and the Stanford Prison Experiment (1971))
It wasn’t lost on me that Hadley and Sitterson use the argument “They have to make the choice of their own free will. Otherwise, system doesn't work. Like the harbinger: creepy old fuck practically wears a sign saying "YOU WILL DIE". Why would we put him there? The system. They have to choose to ignore him. They have to choose what happens in the cellar. yeah, we write the game as much as we have to but in the end, if they don't transgress they can't be punished.”
The implication being that the kids chose to die…(a claim by the way a number of serial killers use to justify them killing their victims) - also playing on the horror movie trope of “Too stupid to live.” - which only works because we the voyeur (sorry viewer) know the “rules” and the kids in the scenario don’t, mainly, usually because they are purposefully written as having never seen a horror genre movie in their life and they don’t know that they are in that exact scenario…
In this individual case though the claim that those kids had any sort of free will is erroneous.. because the faceless group have engineered them into the con, they have drugged them, they have coerced them, they have purposefully not told them the whole truth and in some cases just enveigled them into the position they are in. A fact which you as the viewer are quite happy with because you just drop the kids into teh "too stupid to live" box and gleefully await their demise caused by their enforced ignorance. but its their fault for being stupid.
If this movie were the same as “Scream” where they list and mock the genre tropes. then yes the kids have mocked the fates and so must accept the consequence. In that movie the kids knew the score.. if they didn’t at the first death, then they did by the second death, they knew that there was a killer using horror tropes as a modus operandi and so could have worked against type to "win"..
But in this movie the kids don’t know this, nor do they appear to have any idea about any particular horror tropes. So the idea they can disengage from the process is ludicrous, because they don't know they are in that situation. and its even more ludicrous a thought when you realise that the Faceless organisation has everything stacked in the other direction. All their resources are geered up to get those kids killed. It is never more clearly expressed in the movie as when ever the kids have a "good" idea on a course of action which wil bypass a particular trope e.g. Marty pointing out that reading aloud from the book may be a bad idea, or Curt suggesting that they stay together and/or work as a team. The faceless group turns on the psychology and the drugs to keep them on course and fully compliant with the "story". Its like saying the mouse has the choice not to run through the maze.
As is prevalent in many a Whedon storylines, the over arching theme seems to be based on the idea that humanity rests itself on the shoulders of the individual but that a faceless group of people begin to dictate the actions of the individuals in the name of "the greater good". And by doing this the faceless organisation becomes corupted by its own dogma, and sinks into a base arrogance of believing that it has the right to choose which individuals live or die because.. it can. It has great power and no responsibility. It's a theme which echos through buffy, through firefly through dollhouse.. and the other movies and stories Whedon has a hand in.
I will say for defiante that I don't claim this is a perfect movie. but it is a good movie. it has a strong storline, good actors delivering an excellent performance. Infact all the actors are good from the leads right through to the background staff. Drew Goddard and Joswhedon apear to have been an very successful collaboration. I can only wonder what Cloverfield would have been like had these two worked on it.. but hey ho.
There are a few things that jumped out at me as a bit off. I found the bear trap grabber thing the lead zombie used was just wrong. I realise that it coudl be the embodyment of the trope of "hugely impractical signature weapon” but i just could help but think that it was a stupid and impractical weapon. Spring traps are designed to grab onto sticky out parts of the body, so limbs, possibly head not grab onto expanses of flat flesh. For it to “grab” the back of a human and gain purchase, it would need to have teeth that could lock in and if it had those the spring would be so strong it would just rake through the flesh. It woudl have been more believable if it had either been swung to grab then on the side or if it had locked onto the torso by smashing ribs/spine.. of course leaving the victim immobile and screaming. Which i am guessing was just too horrific, or looked stupid or something. Either way I hated that thing and found it visually just pissed me off.
I was having a few issues with the use of the two person lumberjack saw. But luckily it only gets utilised twice in the movie and the first time it is used its used quite well. It’s the second time that I went “wait a minute!”… but the movie moves swiftly on and so you can just forget about it.
otherwise I can live with this movie quite happily.
When I look at it though.. I came out of the movie wanting to see it again.. which I feel is always a good sign of an enjoyable and engaging experience.
I will be buying the blu-ray of this one (once they produce blu’s that won’t stall your blu-ray player because of an inherent flaw in the encoding…) I very much want this movie to own..
Please watch this movie if you can and enjoy it..
Its worth reading here for a good discussion on the various tropes. But don't go there until you see the movie.
http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Film/TheCabinInTheWoods