Movies I Saw All The Way Through In 2012 With No Fast Forwarding or Anything #7: Cabin In The Woods (2012)
WARNING: SPOILERS! SPOILERS! - IF YOU HAVEN’T SEEN IT, PLEASE ASSUME THIS IS ANOTHER POSITIVE REVIEW HAILING JOSS WHEDON’S WIT AND MASTERY OF SUBTEXT AND MOVE ON.
And sorry so focused on subtext (like 100% of the reviews this film has earned - also please skip if you’re sick of that), but I didn’t find Cabin In The Woods nearly as sanctimonious as Rich J’s review made it sound. The film isn’t hand-wringing or judgmental about the transgressive nature of horror (whatever Whedon or director Drew Goddard said about “torture porn” in interviews), it’s irreverent about the industry’s devotion to cliche - the men in the control room aren’t the audience, they’re filmmakers. If there had not turned out to be an apocalypse at the end, with the stoner instead proving that there were no angry gods if you break the rules, then it would have been preachy. That the world blows up is how you know these guys still love horror movies.
