Adam Wingard’s “You’re Next” is a upper class, low down gritty slasher horror that cuts its teeth and bone into a small, seemingly well-to-do family come under siege in a home invasion from some ne’er do wells simply christened as The Animals.
Events begin inauspiciously enough in “You’re Next” as Erin (Sharni Vinson, “Step Up 3D”) and Crispin Davidson (AJ Bowen, “The House of the Devil”) travel up to a quaint home located in the woods for an anniversary.
Soon enough, we are introduced to the rest of the Davidson family and their various acquaintances.
After those introductions and over what is supposed to be an enjoyable dinner, the home comes under assault from unknown assailants who don animal masks and carry an assortment of crude weaponry to pick off the family one by one.
“You’re Next” is brutal, and effectively so. When the house comes under the assault, there’s an unsettling primal urgency to the families terror and it is a palpable effect which was underutilized in James DeMonaco’s “The Purge.” That feeling quickly gives way to some awfully unwieldy thematics, rigid amature acting, and a strange concoction of gallows humor that works in surprising interesting fashion when in tandem with each other.
“You’re Next” is also quite notable for the large cast of horror directors, actors, and producers featured in the film with Ti West (”The House of the Devil”), Simon Barrett (“V/H/S 2”), Barbara Crampton (“The Re-Animator”), and Joe Swanberg (“Drinking Buddies”) all featured in the principal cast.
Sharni Vinson as Erin, the a doomsday prepper born and raised, is a remarkably strong willed and resourceful character and Vinson gets some very gratifying scenes scenes of vidicative carnage once the tables turn against the occupying force.
“You’re Next” hits familiar notes, a scene involving a camera flashing as the sound of its shutter echos throughout has been done before in James Wan’s “Insidious,” but director Adam Wingard and writer Simon Barrett do squeeze the most out those tense moments.
The film doesn’t peruses around darkened corners of the house and Wingard seems to enjoy showing all the dismemberment in the natural amber light. It’s all for the better, even if the direction is not so subtle seeming as how very simple it is to tell who the Benedict Arnold’s are in the family.
Ultimately, “You’re Next” is a brash, blunt, and terse film that slashes its way straight to the point.
dkahen-kashi@theeagleonline.com
