Thanksgiving

               
Eli Roth's Thanksgiving received a better than average critical reception for a horror film, but sank at the box office. I found it rather tiresome. It reenforced my feeling that Roth sits, at best, amongst the second rank of American horror genre specialists. The plot, concocted by Roth and Jeff Rendell, is a repackaging of Scream. We have a clutch of fresh faced 'high school' thesps terrorized by a masked mystery man. Once again, the police seem hapless and the local television station helps spark a media frenzy. Everything seems second hand. especially the "John Carver" Pilgrim mask of the villain that is a homogenized variant of the "Guy Fawkes" mask worn by Hugo Weaving in V for Vendetta.

Not that Roth wants Thanksgiving to be bland fare. The killings are gruesome and the first act group trauma aims to say something about our country or something. A stampede at a Black Friday sale at a Best Buy-Wal-Mart- type store is based on a clutch of such events, but is so cartoonishly overdone, "Free Waffle Irons" is the giveaway. that, subsequently,  the film only retains a smidge of interest when indulging in black comic killings that revel in decapitations and intestines resembling blutwurst. Roth's cast is not as memorable as in the Craven films and this is fatal. We have no sympathy for or empathy with the intended victims and, thus, no suspense is generated. Everything, even the murders, seems rote. 

The film is not helped by its lack of local flavor. Supposedly set in Plymouth, Massachusetts, but shot in Canada, the film evokes poutine instead of chowder. There are a few attempts at a regional accent, but as usual with Roth, the cast is left to its own devices and stranded amidst a meaningless mise-en-scene. Roth is fine with framing shots and constructing sequences, but, from Cabin Fever on has proved clueless when it comes to enlivening his casts. If you can't establish heroes or villains inside your set-ups, the audience will not be able to enjoy your cinematic thrill ride much less swallow indigestible thematic material. Whatever his artistic or thematic intentions, Roth has not made a satisfying film, just mechanical simulacrum of better ones. I respect his knowledge and love of horror films, but find his work wanting.