Review by
Eric Hillis
Directed by: Halina Reijn
Starring: Amandla Stenberg, Maria Bakalova, Myha'la Herrold, Chase Sui Wonders,
Rachel Sennott, Lee Pace, Pete Davidson
Sometimes a trailer oversells a movie. Take the well-edited promo for
Dutch director Halina Reijn's English language debut
Bodies Bodies Bodies, which makes the film look like a postmodern slasher,
Scream with some added commentary on Gen-Z's
preoccupations with online discourse. There are some gags in the trailer
that land a lot better than in the actual movie, as whoever cut the
trailer seems to have a better understanding of comic timing than the
actual filmmakers. Bodies Bodies Bodies isn't even really
a slasher movie, as the slashing takes place off screen. With the bodies
of the title being stumbled upon by the guests at a mansion on a dark
and stormy night, Reijn's film is a modern take on classic
whodunits.
In most murder mystery movies, the mystery isn't as interesting as the
characters involved. That's the case here, as who done it is sort of a
moot point that the movie itself doesn't seem all that interested in.
Rather Bodies Bodies Bodies is more concerned with
satirising its Gen-Z rich kids, but that satire is a little limp and
comes off very much as the opinion of a Gen-X filmmaker with little more
to say than "Get off my lawn kids!" Young people are awful, the movie
says, especially if they're rich. It's hardly a novel message.
A slasher movie populated with unlikeable young people isn't exactly a
fresh concept either, but here the movie goes out of its way to make its
young characters insufferable. All except for Bee (Maria Bakalova), who also happens to be the one character that isn't American. An
Eastern European of indeterminate origin, Bee also lacks the wealth of
her peers, employed as she is in a mall store. She's somehow managed to
bag herself a rich girlfriend in the form of Sophie (Amandla Stenberg), who brings Bee along for a "storm party" at the sprawling home of
David (Pete Davidson). Also present is David's drama queen
girlfriend Emma (Chase Sui Wonders); the ditzy Alice (Rachel Sennott) and her considerably older boyfriend Greg (Lee Pace); and
Jordan (Myha'la Herrold), who seems to have eyes for Sophie
herself.
Amid a game of "Bodies, Bodies, Bodies," which involves playing at
being killers and corpses, a genuine body turns up, apparently slashed
by a large sword that made an earlier appearance. As the group attempts
to figure out who the killer is, paranoia leads to literal and
metaphorical backstabbing as various resentments rise to the
surface.
Bakalova's Bee is the classic "final girl," the shrewish intellectual
surrounded by vapid glamourpusses, and making this character an Eastern
European immigrant should have added some extra commentary on American
xenophobia. At one point the other girls turn on Bee and accuse her of
being the killer, which might have felt like a sly commentary on
America's current obsession with blaming the East for its own
shortcomings, but the movie has no interest in exploring this route. It
seems the only reason Bee is Eastern European is because the Bulgarian
Bakalova was cast and couldn't pull off a convincing enough American
accent. Regardless, it's an opportunity squandered.
Also squandered is Bakalova's comic chops, so famously deployed in her
breakout role in Borat Subsequent Moviefilm. She's oddly cast in the role of the film's only straight guy, a Bing
Crosby surrounded by Bob Hopes. The best of the comic foils is Sennott,
proving that her excellent comedic turn in
Shiva Baby
wasn't a once off. Sennott gets all the best lines and delivers them
with aplomb. Her Alice is essentially a bimbo, but one who considers
herself an intellectual, and her use of terms she's become familiar with
through online discourse yet doesn't really understand fuels much of the
film's satire.
Unlike the blade that sets the mystery in motion, that satire just
isn't sharp enough. Throwing in a few token references to "gaslighting,"
"triggering" and the like isn't enough to make for a cutting takedown of
Gen-Z. Take out those references and there's really no difference
between this lot and the sociopathic rich kids of the similarly themed
1986 comic slasher April Fool's Day.
