Friday, September 13, 2019

Movie Review - "Ready or Not" (2019)



The problem with "Ready or Not" is its inability to pick a genre and stick with it, opting to sometimes go strictly for a reverse home invasion story as the owners chase an innocent woman around their house, while other times going for comedy by making the owners incompetent, and other times going for grotesque horror with lots of blood, dismemberment and mutilation. The film never adequately delves into one of these to its fullest, and comes across as trying way too hard to be taken seriously when it all feels so shallow.

My biggest complaints stem from the ending and how it went against everything that happened in the movie up to that point. Without giving anything away, there's a late supernatural twist to a film never did anything fantastical before that point. There were a couple hints dropped about occult worshipping, but until the final 20 minutes that was played off for laughs at this crazy family's expense. It comes so far out of left field that it ruins the experience that came before it, turning what was a wacky race through a huge mansion into a brainless, predictable dump that would rather go for the big effects shot instead of something hilarious.

It would have been easy for "Ready or Not" to stick with either a thrilling home invasion with horror elements or a horror comedy that might even feel like a satire of other occult movies like "Rosmary's Baby." But instead there was no thought put into this and the film suffers for it. If the film had gone all in on one or the other, preferably the horror comedy angle and really sell how incompetent the bumbling family is, then this could have been a rare treat of horror, but instead this is a tired concept that doesn't take any chances.

Final Grade: D+
 

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