The Cabin In The Woods (spoiler free)

[andrewducker]

If you like horror movies, particularly dating back to things like Evil Dead II, Hellraiser, etc. then you are in good company, because so did the creators of The Cabin In The Woods.

We're just back from it, and I spent the entire thing just about not hyperventilating, because I am _rubbish_ at horror movies. But I still enjoyed it massively, loved the way it was put together, and think it's well worth seeing.

I shall say nothing at all about it, because frankly discovering what's going on over the course of the movie is where most of the fun is (along with spotting references to movies you have previously seen). The first two thirds are merely good, meta, scary, fun. The final third is just epic. If you have a fondness for horror movies then go see.

(Feel free to have spoileriffic conversations in the comments.)

Comments

[dalglir]

I spent my early to mid teens being raised in a diet of cheap fishcakes, peas, chips and ketchup. And iconic 18 rated horror movies.

I am now looking forward to The Cabin in the Woods very much ^_^

[andrewducker]

As a massive fan of the first two Hellraiser movies I loved the design for Fornicus. And I thought the pullback to show all of the monsters in the cages was great.

The ending was near perfect too, although I might have pulled back a bit further for the final moment. Sigourney Weaver continues to kick ass. Bradley Whitford, Richard Jenkins and Amy Acker are awesome. And the bits in Japan completely cracked me up.

Oh, plus a unicorn! You can't go wrong with a unicorn!

And a self-destruct button! You can go _completely_ wrong with a self-destruct button, in the most awesome way possible!

[werejud.livejournal.com]

I LOVED Cabin in the Woods, and I normally find horror movies quite difficult to watch. It was just so... awesomely epic. /omgcantexpress

[cairmen.livejournal.com]

It was a superb film. I'd love to say more, but I really don't want to spoiler anyone.

[xenophanean.livejournal.com]

I loved the fact they managed to get a reference to Portal in there, think that's the first film one I've seen :)

[andrewducker]

Was that the female voice over the tannoy near the end?

[xenophanean.livejournal.com]

Yeah, big white panelled room, flat female voice talking about how painful their experiences must have been.

[a-pawson.livejournal.com]

We just went to see it too. Very interestng take on the horror genre. One I think I will have to watch again on DVD, not least so I can pause it to try and spot more of the creatures referencing older movies. The list of creatures written on the whiteboard is now on the film's Wikipedia page.

[andrewducker]

It's been taken off the main page, but you can see it in the history at:
http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=The_Cabin_in_the_Woods&oldid=487926735

[momentsmusicaux.livejournal.com]

I was curious about whether the whiteboard matches what we see later.

[a-pawson.livejournal.com]

Ooh yeah me too. I certainly spotted some of the monsters. Think I will have to get the DVD when it is released and pause it many times to see.

[fearmeforiampink]

Glad to hear it was good; horror movies don't do much for me, so I'm not bothering with it, but a good chunk of UD were going to see it last night, so I'm glad it's good, they should enjoy it.

[andrewducker]

UD?

[fearmeforiampink]

Unlock Democracy

[andrewducker]

Aaah, of course!

[fearmeforiampink]

It's one of those things that becomes automatic usage in the office and when talking about related things (e.g. ERS, JRRT, FOI, FoE)

[bracknellexile.livejournal.com]

Awesome film. I know there were lots of references to horror films in general in the film but I think Cube was possibly the biggest one (specifically Cube Zero). It's an obscure film, but a big influence I think, specially with references to "above" and "below", the big-red telephone that never normally rings, the operators completely desensitized to what's on screen, the elevator - and the fact that they end up victims of their creation. Outside the control room, the zoom-out to all the monster cells was very Cube too.

[bracknellexile.livejournal.com]

That's "Cube too", not Cube Two which was kinda crap :)

[chris-walsh.livejournal.com]

I'm glad I can handle horror (I'm admittedly not the biggest fan of it, but I've liked some of it) so I was able to handle the horror parts, allowing me to laugh my ass off for a lot of the other parts. Especially the 3rd act mayhem (that locked-off shot of the elevator lobby COLLAPSED me). My friend I saw it with thought the film was almost a parody.

I really want to see this again.

[bohemiancoast.livejournal.com]

I saw a preview screening, oh, weeks ago, and have been sitting on my hands unable to talk about it ever since! Though I have sort of recommended it to people. There were *lots* of screeners, I think because friends saying 'you'll like this movie, I promise. Go!' is more likely to get bums on seats for a film where the entire plot is a spoiler.

I don't like horror much, but coped with this; I'm sure there were loads of jokes for real aficionados that I missed. Still plenty to amuse.

[andrewducker]

There were plenty of references to everything from Evil Dead (the "angry molesting tree" on the whiteboard) to Hellraiser ("Fornicus, Lord of Pain"), but I'm not sure there were extra jokes, per se.

More of the jokes were around horror tropes like "Let's split up" and "Having sex=death", and why people behave quite so stupidly in those situations.

[johnbobshaun.livejournal.com]

I nearly did a spit-take when I saw "Angry Molesting Tree" on the whiteboard.

And the fact that we got to see everything written on that board was amazing.

[octopoid-horror.livejournal.com]

I shall say nothing at all about it, because frankly discovering what's going on over the course of the movie is where most of the fun is (along with spotting references to movies you have previously seen). The first two thirds are merely good, meta, scary, fun

People said this about Scream. And Scream 2. And probably Scary Movie.

[andrewducker]

And, IMHO, they were right about the first one of those, which did a nice job of putting people who had seen scary movies into the middle of one, allowing them to comment on the tropes. It wore thin very quickly though.

[johnbobshaun.livejournal.com]

I don't really like the Scream films. I think the first one is well made, that's about it.

In Cabin In the Woods, the traditional slasher-y stuff with the kids in the cabin is the least interesting stuff in the film. And is probably less than 50% of the film.

I'm struggling to even classify it as a horror film, really.