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Cabin in The Woods - April 13th - Best horror film in years?

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P

PhoncipleBone

Banned
Wife and I just got back, and it was a lot of fun. No, the trailers don't give anything away that the first scene in the movie doesn't. But unfortunately we both figured out what the "twist" (if you could even call it that) was during
the opening credits. All the images of human sacrifice, etc. I just turned to my wife and said "They have to make sacrifices to Cthulhu or something. Watch."

Sure enough, it was pretty close to that.

Granted, figuring that out did not diminish the fun during the last thirty minutes. That was fantastic. And like others said about the final shot:
I was disappointed it was a humanoid hand. I was wanting Cthulhu in all his glory rising from the depths. Or at least something monstrous looking.

But yeah, the less you know the better, but I would not really call anything a "twist."
 
I

ivysaur12

Banned
PhoncipleBone said:
Wife and I just got back, and it was a lot of fun. No, the trailers don't give anything away that the first scene in the movie doesn't. But unfortunately we both figured out what the "twist" (if you could even call it that) was during
the opening credits. All the images of human sacrifice, etc. I just turned to my wife and said "They have to make sacrifices to Cthulhu or something. Watch."

Sure enough, it was pretty close to that.

Granted, figuring that out did not diminish the fun during the last thirty minutes. That was fantastic. And like others said about the final shot:
I was disappointed it was a humanoid hand. I was wanting Cthulhu in all his glory rising from the depths. Or at least something monstrous looking.

But yeah, the less you know the better, but I would not really call anything a "twist."
Click to expand...

The only real "twist" for me was
Sigourney Weaver
. But it's also a thematic thing that was more "twisty" - it wasn't what I thought it was going to be about, and it was great.
 
D

Daft_Cat

Member
So good.

Gave me that Evil Dead feeling.
There's such an amazing dissonance between where the film begins and where it ends.

5 kids go into a creepy old forest cabin --> the Ancient God's of myth return to retake the earth

3.5/4 from me.

Dead said:
Just remembered, the title card at the beginning was awesome. Got huge laughter.
Click to expand...

Yes. Genius. My friend and I remarked afterwards that we were basically sold from that point on.
 
I

ivysaur12

Banned
All 5 of the kids are super talented. It's too bad this didnt come out before pilot season. At least for Connoly and Hutchinson.
 
K

~Kinggi~

Banned
Super smart move to have
Richard Jenkins
in the movie. I didnt even know he was in it before watching. And yeah the title card was hilarious.
 
N

Neuromancer

Member
The asshole couple in front of me who kept talking during the beginning of the movie, and playing with their phones throughout, left 3/4 of the way through. I felt a strange sense of satisfaction.
 
P

PhoncipleBone

Banned
ivysaur12 said:
All 5 of the kids are super talented. It's too bad this didnt come out before pilot season.
Click to expand...

Superior Hemsworth in the house.

And obviously it was filmed pre-Thor. Hemsworth was only the size of a shed in this, as opposed to the size of a large house like he was in Thor and will be in Avengers.

And I now have a crush on Kristen Connolly.
 
I

ivysaur12

Banned
PhoncipleBone said:
Superior Hemsworth in the house.

And obviously it was filmed pre-Thor. Hemsworth was only the size of a shed in this, as opposed to the size of a large house like he was in Thor and will be in Avengers.

And I now have a crush on Kristen Connolly.
Click to expand...

Well, Hemsworth is on his way to being our new action star, and Jesse is on Grey's. Fran's stared in 2 shows and is already in the system.

This film is unbelievable for Connolly and Hutchison - they should have no problem getting work (I believe Anna just signed with a new agent yesterday?). But if this had come out a few months ago, chances are they'd both be in pilots now.
 
E

EleventhDoctor

Banned
Saw it and loved it-pretty much a perfect movie in my opinion. We are very fortunate that a movie like this was made.

One minor nitpick:
They shouldn't have shown the bird hitting the wall. It would have made the scene of Hemsworth's death more...ahem...impactful
 
S

Shao Kahn Brewing a Stew

Banned
MDavis360 said:
Saw it and loved it-pretty much a perfect movie in my opinion. We are very fortunate that a movie like this was made.

One minor nitpick:
They shouldn't have shown the bird hitting the wall. It would have made the scene of Hemsworth's death more...ahem...impactful
Click to expand...

I agree, but it was necessary to spoon feed the audience with the premises.

With that said, what an awesome movie! Brilliant homage to the genre itself, even if it wasn't scary enough.

My favorite moment: Ending credits music! \m/ I rocked my way out singing the entire song! :p
 
E

EliteArtist

Member
MDavis360 said:
Saw it and loved it-pretty much a perfect movie in my opinion. We are very fortunate that a movie like this was made.

One minor nitpick:
They shouldn't have shown the bird hitting the wall. It would have made the scene of Hemsworth's death more...ahem...impactful
Click to expand...

but then where would I get my self satisfaction from seeing the audience reaction because they didn't remember the bird from earlier? Plus for those who remember, you start paying attention to what his last words are going to be because let's be honest, if he just randomly dies after saying something great few people would've taken the time to remember.
 
F

FrenchMovieTheme

Member
MDavis360 said:
Saw it and loved it-pretty much a perfect movie in my opinion. We are very fortunate that a movie like this was made.

One minor nitpick:
They shouldn't have shown the bird hitting the wall. It would have made the scene of Hemsworth's death more...ahem...impactful
Click to expand...

that is what i was thinking when i walked out of the movie

edit - walked out after it was over of course.... not walked out as in i didn't like it so i refused to stay
 
E

EleventhDoctor

Banned
MONDO-CABIN-WOODS_510.jpg
 
B

bachikarn

Member
I didn't like the ending at first. It seemed like a cliche twist for
the ritual not to work and the ancient gods being released and destroying humanity
. Once I understood the extended metaphor though, I thought it was pretty sick.
 
E

echoshifting

Banned
Just got back from this. I thought it was absolutely brilliant. I didn't find it that scary but it scared the crap out of my wife.

1 nitpick:
Seems like that "purge" button is something that should have a password or physical key...
 
JimiNutz

JimiNutz

Banned
I enjoyed it but it wasn't a horror film.
I saw the trailer but tried to avoid reading anything about the film. Went in expecting a horror film, got a comedy.
I did enjoy it though but wouldn't recommend it to anyone as a horror film. If people go in expecting a comedy I think they'll enjoy it more.
 
S

Superman00

Liverpool01
bachikarn said:
I didn't like the ending at first, but I think it makes sense on a thematic level.
Topher said something like "maybe we need a change." They changed the cliche story at the end, so the ancient God's were released and humanity dies.

This is symbolic of a movie not following the normal stereotypes and becoming really popular. Then all movies after that start using that movie as at template. So humanity dying and being replaced = a new movie cliche.

I guess a lot of people are interpreting it the opposite way. That a change in the cliche causes outrage by the audience and this is symbolized by the Ancient Gods bursting out at the end.
Click to expand...

Yeah, in horror movies, at the end they always leave some kind of ending that hint that there may be a sequel. But with this ending, shit is done, ancient God is release and humanity is fucked.
 
E

eudaemonic

Member
It's more a
monster
movie than anything else in my opinion.

A delicious monster movie with horror and comedy elements. Fuck yeah!
 
E

EleventhDoctor

Banned
echoshifting said:
Just got back from this. I thought it was absolutely brilliant. I didn't find it that scary but it scared the crap out of my wife.

1 nitpick:
Seems like that "purge" button is something that should have a password or physical key...
Click to expand...

Realistically yes-but that would have just gotten in the way of that cathartic release "hell yes moment.
 
LightofRohan

LightofRohan

Member
It was pretty good, goddam ballsy marketing campaign and movie poster. Goes against everything Hollywood is set up to do. Just looks like a cheesy generic horror film. I enjoyed that the most...

I got tired of the endless bringing up of weed... k, we get it, people like it. Shut up. Didn't help that my stoner friends told me I had to see it.

Want to see it again however, the projector/sound in the theater was complete shit.
 
R

ryutaro's mama

Member
Fantastic movie.

Loved every minute of it. One thing I didn't get was,
the old dude @ the gas station referred to "the war" and him being there since the beginning of "the war". When quizzed about it, he retorted, "You know exactly what fucking war." What gives? Was he supposed to be a hic referring to the Civil War or was he talking about a war from the past?

Also, Marty and Dana both
called out the "Puppetmasters" as though they suddenly realized that they were being filmed. Were they breaking the 4th wall here?

Also, the lab people
kept referring to the fact that many more people were watching this as well. Were they referring to us, the audience?
 
N

NotTheGuyYouKill

Member
It's been like 10 hours since I watched it, and I'm still mulling over the film. That's the mark of a good film, it stays with you.

I keep going over the third act in my head, and it's just so great. Perfect craziness. The only regret I had was that I had to hold in a major piss since about the halfway point but didn't wanna leave. With about 10 minutes to go, I finally got up and was about to leave when
The Director/Weaver showed up
and I just had to stay and watch, so I stood in the aisle to the side to watch the rest of the movie.

Should have gone before the movie... tsk tsk tsk.

Still not a huge fan of the end-end though.
 
V

Vagabundo

Member
A weird, funny and interesting film.

But I couldn't shake a little feeling disappointment on my way home as I had been expecting to be scared and it is not a horror.
 
B

bachikarn

Member
About the ending (do we still need spoiler tags since the movie is out?),
I see a lot of people saying the ancient gods are representative of the audience. I think that makes a lot of sense, but I was thinking that the gods could also be representatives of the executives who finance the movies. It makes sense from a hierarchical standpoint. Ancient Gods: The Director :: Producers: Movie Director.

They execs demand movies follow some sort of lose stereotype because that's what sells. They like to see some variation of the formula (and that's why there were all those different possibilities for how the 5 kids in the cabin die), but they still want the fundamental formula to be the same. If a writer or director tries to do something different, the execs get pissed and demand rewrites or cancel the project. This is symbolized by the ancient gods bursting out and killing humanity.
 
E

EliteArtist

Member
NotTheGuyYouKill said:
It's been like 10 hours since I watched it, and I'm still mulling over the film. That's the mark of a good film, it stays with you.

I keep going over the third act in my head, and it's just so great. Perfect craziness. The only regret I had was that I had to hold in a major piss since about the halfway point but didn't wanna leave. With about 10 minutes to go, I finally got up and was about to leave when
The Director/Weaver showed up
and I just had to stay and watch, so I stood in the aisle to the side to watch the rest of the movie.

Should have gone before the movie... tsk tsk tsk.

Still not a huge fan of the end-end though.
Click to expand...

Same here. I can't stop going over everything in the movie.
For some reason I keep coming back to Chris Hemsworth's death in the film. Not a clue as to why really.
 
H

HP_Wuvcraft

Banned
This was a fantastic film. Way beyond my expectations. Perfect satire. They nailed every "thing" perfectly, taking the time to explain why everything was what it was as not to kill us with a bunch of vague weird shit happening. Loved it.

I lost my voice convincing my friend to go see it.
 
LightofRohan

LightofRohan

Member
Vagabundo said:
A weird, funny and interesting film.

But I couldn't shake a little feeling disappointment on my way home as I had been expecting to be scared and it is not a horror.
Click to expand...

Yea I was a bit disappointed due to everyone telling me, "You have to go see this now, don't look up anything!" so I was expecting some deep drama, with some intense twist ending that would be deeply impactful. Haha, so I was ready to be sophisticated!
 
S

Superman00

Liverpool01
ryutaro's mama said:
Fantastic movie.

Loved every minute of it. One thing I didn't get was,
the old dude @ the gas station referred to "the war" and him being there since the beginning of "the war". When quizzed about it, he retorted, "You know exactly what fucking war." What gives? Was he supposed to be a hic referring to the Civil War or was he talking about a war from the past?

Also, Marty and Dana both
called out the "Puppetmasters" as though they suddenly realized that they were being filmed. Were they breaking the 4th wall here?

Also, the lab people
kept referring to the fact that many more people were watching this as well. Were they referring to us, the audience?
Click to expand...

The "puppetmasters" they were referring to were the guys in the lab, they were releasing chemicals, whispering in their ears, use a dye chemical to make the girl into a slut, and so on.
The lab guys could have been referring to the audiences or the other countries. There were many rituals going on, each one being shown, and all of them failed.
 
E

EleventhDoctor

Banned
Superman00 said:
The "puppetmasters" they were referring to were the guys in the lab, they were releasing chemicals, whispering in their ears, use a dye chemical to make the girl into a slut, and so on.
The lab guys could have been referring to the audiences or the other countries. There were many rituals going on, each one being shown, and all of them failed.
Click to expand...

when referring to someone else watching they're talking about The Ancient Ones.

Can we get a dedicated Spoiler thread for thus movie so we don't have to mark up every interesting conversation?
 
K

KevinCow

Banned
MDavis360 said:
One minor nitpick:
They shouldn't have shown the bird hitting the wall. It would have made the scene of Hemsworth's death more...ahem...impactful
Click to expand...

I liked the way they did that.
It worked both ways. If you remembered the force field, then the whole buildup is spent knowing what's coming, hoping that they'll find a way to stop him, or notice the force field somehow, or... something. And then the second he leaves the ramp to when he hits the wall, you know what's gonna happen, you just wonder how bad it's gonna be. And even knowing, that impact was still pretty damn painful.

If you happened to forget the force field, which I'm sure there were viewers who did, then it was probably pretty damn shocking and unexpected.

bachikarn said:
About the ending (do we still need spoiler tags since the movie is out?)
Click to expand...

Yes. Not everybody sees movies on release day, or even release weekend.
 
C

catotheyounger

Member
At the time, I thought that the twist was going to be that the Virgin shoots and kills the Fool, only to realize that she is the Fool - because he was actually the Virgin - playing on viewer expectations, her virginity was at question from the get go as well. Or a variation on that, ie the one-armed zombie finishing off the girl (the secret fool) and ending the ritual. Great payoffs at every corner at the end. Amazing.
 
H

HP_Wuvcraft

Banned
I thought showing us the force field in the beginning of the film worked, since it was not something we normally attribute with the horror genre.

Also, my friend thought this was how it would end:
Patience was a virgin, so it would end up pleasing Executive Cthulhu.
 
H

HP_Wuvcraft

Banned
As for that AICN article,
I think that, while the logic is sound, the Ancient Ones are actually the studio heads
.

When I exited the theater, there was this guy that was projecting for all to hear his distaste of the film. Like, he really must have hated it in order to be so passionate about informing the other movie-goers that it was crap.
 
R

RagnarokX

Member
catotheyounger said:
At the time, I thought that the twist was going to be that the Virgin shoots and kills the Fool, only to realize that she is the Fool - because he was actually the Virgin - playing on viewer expectations, her virginity was at question from the get go as well. Or a variation on that, ie the one-armed zombie finishing off the girl (the secret fool) and ending the ritual. Great payoffs at every corner at the end. Amazing.
Click to expand...

No... they made it pretty clear
who had which roles at the start of the film. And they activated the fool carving when they thought he died.
 
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