The Cabin in the Woods

Joss Whedon’s high-concept chiller is a one-off curiosity that promises much but delivers little scariness, wit or insight

Grand claims are being made for The Cabin in the Woods. Distributor Lionsgate maintains it’s "a mind-blowing horror film that turns the genre inside out". It feels to Variety like "the start of something new: a smarter, more self-aware kind of chiller". According to the Shiznit: "The Cabin in the Woods is a total game-changer."

In the film, a group of horror-victim stereotypes head off to the backwoods where genre convention would require them to be assailed by either psychopathic or phantasmic demons. But, Lionsgate forewarns us: "If you think you know this story, think again." This seems to imply what will blow our minds is a sensational big reveal of the kind on which Psycho, The Sixth Sense or Memento relies. Yet this isn’t quite the case.

The film opens not with the departure of the ill-fated youngsters, but with chit-chat between corporate operatives working in some kind of high-tech command centre. If you think you’ve just been hit by an execrable spoiler, you haven’t seen the trailer, which not only shows us techies operating a kind of TV control room, but also an electronic version of The Truman Show’s set wall.

So we’re tipped off well in advance that the action’s going to be technologically manipulated. Presumably this is to make us appreciate there’s a high concept in play. Fair enough, but it means horror has to be sacrificed as well as suspense. Such credibility as might have existed evaporates. Worse, awareness that the characters are simply pawns in someone’s grand videogame saps their experiences of the capacity to thrill.

We know, even if the characters don’t, that an apparently spooky prop must be a red herring. The death-dealing entities they confront may scare them, but they don’t scare us. After all, we already appreciate that they’re only glorified CGI. Still, just why all this business is being engineered does remain a mystery right up to the finale.

By then, in view of the flatness of the story so far, it feels as if the explanation offered had better be good. It’s certainly innovative. Unfortunately, it neglects to explain the more intriguing features of the system we’ve been observing. More damagingly, it fails to connect with any actual fears that the audience are likely to harbour. Because of this, it’s even less horrifying than what precedes its unveiling.

If this supposedly mind-blowing exercise isn’t actually frightening, wherein might lie its supposed transcendence? Clearly that high concept must hold the answer, and indeed producer and co-writer Joss Whedon has kindly tipped us a wink. The Cabin in the Woods, he tells us, is not just "a joyous scary movie" but also "a critique of the horror film" (see video above).

An impressive array of the horror tropes of the last few decades is indeed paraded before us. Fanboys seem to have found this hilarious; others may find it tiresome. In itself, however, it hardly amounts to a deconstruction of the genre. Joss Whedon on The Cabin in the Woods Link to this video

Whedon suggests that he’s denigrating "a trend towards torture porn" in recent horror movie-making. Some critics seem to have risen to this bait. According to Nick Schager of Slant magazine, we’re being reminded that film-makers cynically manipulate their material to deliver predictable if brutish drama "as a means of appeasing powerful unseen forces (ie the audience) that will revolt if not satisfied in preordained ways."

Roger Ebert is even more fanciful: "This is essentially an attempt to codify free will. Do horror characters make choices because of the requirements of the genre, or because of their own decisions? And since they’re entirely the instruments of their creators, to what degree can the film-makers exercise free will?"

According to Ebert: "This is pretty bold stuff." Perhaps, on the other hand, it’s a load of old cobblers. The truth is that the hints of portentousness in which The Cabin in the Woods deals actually lead nowhere at all. Insofar as it exists, the implication that either making or watching gory horror films is in some sense pernicious proves entirely vapid. No one’s going to leave the cinema searching his or her soul.

This is a film that can claim to be original. In view of what fills our screens most of the time, this ought to win it some points. Nonetheless, it achieves no breakthrough in either scariness, wit or insight. It’s a one-off curiosity that promises much but delivers little. It may attract a curious multitude, but it certainly won’t reshape the future of horror.