Jordan Kaminski’s review published on Letterboxd:
This one is not for the people who get frustrated and yell at the characters when they are objectively doing something very stupid.
Shame, this could've been really good for Canadian Cinema. Mysterious invitation to a nice dinner in an old house is one of my favourite genres, the concept was there, just executed poorly.
First off the tone of this film is all over the place. It's like Caitlin had two different ways she wanted to make this film but couldn't commit to one so decided to blend them together half way through the film in a way that just did not work. She couldn't decide on making a standard thriller or a thriller-comedy (like a 'Knives Out').
This felt like every scene was a first take and shot with an uninspired camera. Usually in these types of movies the house (or setting) is it's own character itself, but here it is just boring and empty. The pace was all over the place and felt like big chunks of the film were left out especially in the third act. The characters are all laughably dumb and make terrible decisions throughout, physically and emotionally. The ending also pissed me off, it was such a safe choice and just added more to the characters' stupidity. She tried to end it ambiguously but couldn't help herself at the finish line. I took a half star off just cause of it.
The dialogue in this movie is also very frustrating, these millennial aged characters constantly use super inauthentic on the nose Gen Z 'wordisms' and it just pulls you right out the movie and makes you cringe. Film is about escapism and when filmmakers force this type of dialogue in a unnatural way it just sucks. Oh and there's a character here that literally tries the Batman V Superman 'Martha' tactic to save her life, and it actually works! Crazy.
Overall, it's Caitlin Cronenberg's debut film. I can't fault her too much for that. We'll see where she takes her filmmaking next with an open mind.
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