Thanksgiving Movie Review: An Undercooked Mess of a Meal
Thanksgiving Movie Review: An Undercooked Mess of a Meal
By Dylan Barbee
Release Date: November 17, 2023
Thanksgiving is a sloppy, undercooked horror film. In the latest attempt at creating a classic seasonal slasher, Thanksgiving follows a letdown of a killing spree that occurs in Plymouth, Massachusetts a year after an abnormally gruesome Black Friday riot inside a store. The Eli Roth film relies too much on exaggerated gore in hopes to become a new horror cult favorite like John Carpenter’s Halloween or Wes Craven’s Scream instead of coming up with an enjoyable plot.
The film functions on a noticeably poorly written script filled with embarrassing dialogue performed by a mediocre cast. The movie focuses on a group of ignorant and unlikeable teenagers more than it does on the actual slasher, making the tone of the film confusing. The face-palm jokes do not land and do not pair well with the gory sequences driven by the killer. I can’t tell if this movie is taking itself seriously or not, as it jarringly goes from stupid to morbid from scene to scene.
Thanksgiving is a missed opportunity. The horror sequences leading up to each death are impressive. Eli Roth does a great job of creating suspense and setting up scenes around the slasher but unfortunately, they are not able to reach their full potential at times due to the excessive amount of gore that just looks unrealistic and off-putting. How does someone get their body cut in half by a recycling bin?
Even the most sadistic deaths like corn on the cob skewers in the ears, a decapitation and getting stabbed various times through a trampoline were predictable and poorly executed.
However, the horror sequence that takes place in the last act is memorable. As a character attempts to make a nimble escape from the killer who was seasoning her while asleep, she eventually gets stopped and wakes up to her being burned alive in an oven and served to the majority of the cast as a human turkey. This sequence was chilling, but it shouldn't have taken an hour and thirty minutes to get to the most nail-biting part of the film.
The film lacks the cast to be a humorous horror classic like Scream, has few moments where the villain is as menacing as Micheal Myers in Halloween and is missing the tight writing and consistent tone of recent horror classics like It.
Although the movie finishes strong, the rest of the film is not good enough to make up for it with a lazy script that is delivered by a mediocre cast. Even the strong finish is drawn out by a dumb police chase and a rushed twist reveal. I will definitely not be revisiting this Thanksgiving dinner disaster anytime soon.
Rating: 4.5/10
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