Until Dawn

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I have a personal trend regarding video game-adapted movies in that I haven't played the game in about nine cases out of ten, and 'Until Dawn' is no exception. So, while fans of these games can poke at everything wrong with these movies, I can approach them from the other side. In other words, I can watch these and ask, "Is it just a good movie?" So, I go in with an open mind, and in this case, I was looking for a good horror movie, and I got a pretty decent one overall, all considered.

As with any video game adaptation, however, this one has been criticized for being unfaithful to the source material and the idea that it's a story that takes place in the same universe to "expand" on the game's lore. Being none the wiser, however, this was conceptually pretty cool, taking the tired concept of a group of teens going up against something horrific and trying to survive. But this took things a step further, even though it's using something that is slowly becoming a trope - the idea of "extra lives," which has been portrayed in horror before with movies like 'Happy Death Day.' That said, however, it seems to also be a part of the game.

Sometime before the film's events, a girl named Melanie goes missing, prompting her sister Clover (Ella Rubin), along with her ex, Max (Michael Cimino), and friends, Nina (Odessa A'zion), her boyfriend, Abe (Belmont Cameli) and apparent clairvoyant, Megan (Ji-young Yoo), to retrace Mel's steps and search for her in the surrounding area, which starts with a stop at a gas station, where they meet Dr. Hill (Peter Stormare) who directs them to the sleepy mining town of Glore Valley, where "a lot of people go missing."

The group heads towards the town when a violent rainstorm forces them to take shelter at a nearby town visitor's centre, which, oddly, seems to exist in a strange, dry bubble out of the storm. Before long, the group explores the seemingly abandoned visitor's centre, stumbling on things like a guestbook with repeated signatures, a wall of missing person posters, and, most bizarrely, a big clock with an hourglass. As everyone does their separate thing, they don't realize that they've just become part of something sinister.

Almost immediately, the group gets killed off, one by one, only to have the clock with the hourglass in it flip over, reset, and bring everyone back to their respective "starting points" to try again. However, with each attempt to survive the night, each person becomes increasingly wounded and deformed, slowly becoming a creature. If they don't get out of this, they'll fully transform into "Wendigos" and "become part of the night." I don't know what's accurate to the game and what isn't, but I had fun with it.

In some ways, it reminded me of 'The Cabin in the Woods,' showing how your choices can ultimately lead to your doom. However, this brings it to the point of being afraid to do anything. I won't spoil it, but I will say that one particular night, the group does something incredibly mundane, leading to an almost hilarious kill sequence. I don't want to sound too sadistic, but I did laugh out loud. One thing that worked for me in this movie was that there was a sort of self-awareness that was funnier than I thought it might be.

As a straightforward horror flick, this works out well, even if it recycles a trope or two that we've seen repeatedly and becomes somewhat predictable. Fans of the game should probably go in with lowered expectations because it seems the kind of adaptation that veers away from what the fans of the source material are used to, aside from some of the bare basics. I could give it more credit if I saw more positive reviews from the game's fans. As much fun as I may have had with it, accepting it for what it was, I still firmly believe that true fans should come first and keep demanding better.

3/5

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