branflakes4547

The movie started out pretty clumsily, but by maybe the 30 minute mark they had sold me. As the movie went on I began to realize I was watching a good version of "Get Out" with actors from Malcolm X. It was pretty evident that the film makers were saying that any form of whiteness is bad. The person that lets the "devil" in, is half-white. All the white characters are literally bloodthirsty savages. The thing is, it's all backed up by the bible, voodoo mysticism, and tribalism, so the movie seems to be saying it's okay to hate certain groups when you're not one of them. Apparently it's not a double standard when looking at it from their chosen perspective.

We could all not be separatists and embrace each other as is logical, but that's not what Hollywood wants. The movie and their ideologies wouldn't make sense if you melded cultures. It has to be one sided, and forever divided between race lines, as described by the movies in 2025.

There are probably four really solid science fiction movies you could make out of this, but instead they went with trying to provide biting social commentary, which belly flopped to dead silence in the theater. It's at its absolute worst when it tries to be funny. The movie isn't clever, although it tries to beat you over the head with the lowest hanging fruit of social commentary. If it was funny, that would be great, but it was so hacky and played out. We've seen all these jokes 100 times on SNL already. The only reason I would say this is a not dumpster fire is because they were actually trying to say something. But 90% of jokes after the first 30 minutes were downright embarassing. It had major potential to start up a really interesting world, but any amount of world building or tension or humor was interrupted by cruise ship comedian level attempts at social commentary. There's nothing original other than the really cool premise, which takes a complete back seat so you know that the actors and producers care about social matters. Otherwise what else would the movie be? Entertaining??

The movie is 90% convincing, with great attention to historical and linguistic detail, but Bill Skarsgård deflated the movie . Not sure what Robert Eggers was thinking with his casting. Bill sounds like someone doing a scary monster voice for a child. His Nosferatu "performance" is akin to a bad imitation of Bela Legosi and Dr. Claw from Inspector Gadget - When you're the son of one of the greatest actors of our generation, and can't hold a flame to your siblings, what do you do? Answer: hide yourself in 80 pounds of makeup. He doesn't sound like an old man, nor a monster. He sounds like a kid trying to tell a spooky ghost story, and it's borderline awful. The movie was pretty phenomenal otherwise. Probably the weakest of Robert Eggers's films.

9/10 without Bill Skarsgård, and 7/10 with Bill Skarsgård.