YOU’RE NEXT
In my eyes, the best horror films are the ones that wash their thrills and chills down with a healthy sense of humor. Whether it’s the subversive edge of GET OUT or the meta quality of the SCREAM franchise, seeing characters acknowledge the absurdity of the horrifying situations they find themselves in just makes those films all the more amusing, and frankly, truthful. For that reason, I'm lending the spotlight this weekend to Adam Wingard’s YOU’RE NEXT (trailer here), one of the most criminally underrated horror-comedies of the last decade. The film follows Erin (Sharni Vinson), college student and ostensible ingenue, who accompanies her professor boyfriend Crispin to his childhood home for his parents’ 35th wedding anniversary. As the family settles into their remote mansion in the middle of nowhere, the dysfunction jumps right off the screen. You can’t help but watch as Crispin, his insufferable siblings, and their spouses bicker their way through dinner, criticizing each other’s jobs and relationships….until a crossbow bolt crashes through the window and impales one of them in the head mid-sentence. The film instantly shifts gears into a high-octane, farcical bloodbath as a crew of masked killers descends upon the mansion and targets the family. Without giving too much away, YOU’RE NEXT doesn’t waste a single second of its lean, 94-minute runtime, as Erin strategizes against the killers and tries to stay one step ahead. Boasting some wildly inventive (and hilarious) kills and clever twists that’ll keep you hooked until the credits roll, YOU’RE NEXT could most aptly be described as the twisted love child of KNIVES OUT, SCREAM, and THE STRANGERS—in other words, an absolute blast.
—Neal Mulani, Development Assistant
