Movie Review--Ready Or Not

"At midnight, we have to play a game."
--Alex le Domas, Ready or Not


Ready or Not, with its mixture of brutal violence and spurts of comedy, is easily one of the best films of the year, succeeding on practically every level.  The film's story merges ambiguous metaphysical elements with a tale of a secretive and homocidal family in a way that takes some familiar elements and gives them a new context.  The trailers certainly withhold a great deal of information about the plot, including the philosophical and personal motivations behind the murderous behaviors of protagonist Grace's new in-laws.


Production Values

From the costumes and scenery to the dialogue and performances, Ready or Not is a production value powerhouse standing on a superb script.  The film blends very dark elements with genuine humor without having one aspect drown out the other, something that many movies fail to consistently accomplish.  There are few, if any, wasted scenes, the gravity of the story never losing momentum even during the most comedy-oriented moments.

Samara Weaving (who plays Grace), along with the other actresses and actors, is one of the biggest reasons why the execution of the jokes never contradicts the darkness of the atmosphere.  Her delivery elevates lines that already fit well into the context of the story to even greater heights.  Similarly, Mark O'Brien does an excellent job of portraying her husband, who skillfully navigates his role despite having less time onscreen.  The other members of the supporting cast handle their parts well, with several of them showing a great talent for comedic acting.


Story

Spoilers!

The le Domas family, enriched by great success in the board game industry, holds a wedding at a grand mansion.  A woman named Grace marries Alex le Domas, who attempts to inform her about some of the more abnormal family practices.  One such tradition is a family game night after weddings.  Grace selects a game by retrieving a card from an enigmatic device, but when she reveals that the game she chose is hide and seek, the family winces, preparing a variety of weapons after Grace exits the room in search of a place to hide.  She is unaware of the stakes of this game of hide and seek, just as she is unaware that Alex's family members hope to use her for an unspecified ritual.

I will not detail any more of the story because the trailers did a great job of concealing several major plot and lore elements.


Intellectual Content

At the core of Ready or Not is a family bent on preserving itself without regard for reason or morality, a fact that naturally displays the destructive consequences of making almost everything in one's life revolve around family ties.  In a refreshing contrast to the popularity of the idea that family deserves one's utmost devotion, the film highlights the obvious personal pitfalls of living for family over everything else in a much more extreme way than some people might expect, even if its creators only intended for the movie to be entertaining as a horror story.


Conclusion

Anyone looking for a new film that provides both brutality and humor should find viewing Ready or Not to be a highly satisfying experience.  At the very least, anyone looking for a horror-comedy movie will find that there is much more to the in-universe lore than the marketing suggests, which is admirable in a time when many stories have shallow plots.  Horror fans might want to give the movie a try for this reason alone.  As stated in the introductory paragraph, it's easily one of the year's best films thus far.


Content:
 1.  Violence:  This is certainly a bloody movie.  While the fights and killings leading up to the finale sometimes have more blood than the average film, a scene near the end is particularly graphic.
 2.  Profanity:  Various characters contribute to a high f-bomb count.