Netquix: You're Next (2011)

Netflix content reviewed in 150 words. Or thereabouts.

YOU'RE NEXT (2011)

Dir: Adam Wingard

Running Time: 95 minutes

A swiftly-paced home-invasion horror, You’re Next barrels along admirably for the popcorn crowd. With a tongue placed joyously in cheek, the remainder of the film’s metaphorical body lies strewn across the set in dismembered body parts and bloody guts.

 

"Who ordered the axe?"

Her on the right is her off've Re-Animator

A simple tale expediently told, the script wastes no time - it establishes immediately the antagonists’ brutal modus operandi and the unwitting victims to whom the carnage is meted out in pleasingly rapid succession. There’s certainly a pull on well-worn hastily-sketched horror caricatures, but the relatively unknown cast play their parts with a tangible bite that fills the screen. Particularly enjoyable are Sharni Vinson’s unexpectedly resourceful antipodean hero and Joe Swanberg’s boorish Drake.

With a knowing 1980’s video nasty era synth score, director Wingard tonally atones to genre fans for his other effort - the disappointing dirge that was V/H/S.* Because essentially, it’s everything that mean-spirited film isn’t: exhilarating, tense, and fun.

8/10

*made after but released prior.