Quentin Tarantino hasn’t done a straight horror film, but if he had, it might’ve looked something like “Barbarian.” This film immediately puts writer-director Zach Cregger on the Hollywood map as he gleefully starts his story at point A, ends at point Z, and takes wild 90 degree turns in between that enhance our interest rather than sacrificing it.
Set in present-day rundown residential Detroit, “Barbarian” is a horror fairy tale that makes pointed real-world commentaries despite being over-the-top, sometimes to the point of laughs. Cregger anthropomorphizes Detroit’s decay via the titular monster. He eventually digs deep into relative human morality, but not from the obvious angle.
It’s so creepy in the D
“Barbarian” starts with a common movie fear; it will seem tame by the time it’s over but it nonetheless hooks us in a slow-burn way. Tess (Georgina Campbell) arrives at her Airbnb late at night only to find it’s been mistakenly double-booked: Bill Skarsgard’s Keith is already there. It’s as if Cregger is in a contest with “Gone in the Night” to build a story from the same premise; if so, he wins (although I liked the other film too).
“Barbarian” (2022)
Director: Zach Cregger
Writer: Zach Cregger
Stars: Georgina Campbell, Bill Skarsgard, Justin Long
If there’s nothing scarier than awkwardness, then we hang on every moment as Tess digs through Keith’s wallet and toiletries. He seems like a decent, normal guy who is a victim of this mix-up just like she is. Tess agrees to share the house for the night (a convention has booked all the city’s hotel rooms). But, of course, she locks her room – “stranger danger” is still on her mind.
A good way to make effective horror is to ratchet things up. Start with something a little scary and build to scarier things. “Barbarian” does this masterfully, as Tess and Keith find themselves facing a greater fear than each other.
At the midway point, Cregger reaches a delicious climax over the house’s mysteries, then smash-cuts to what seems like a whole ’nother story in Tarantino-esque fashion. It takes guts to not only stitch two concepts together, but also to set Concept A aside to focus entirely on Concept B. Horror fans generally don’t like this approach – see the reaction to “Halloween Ends.”
Fortunately, Concept B is great, too, thanks to Justin Long (“House of Darkness”) as Hollywood director and mildly reformed dude-bro AJ. Also, we’re riding the residual adrenaline from how Concept A ends. We appreciate the natural comic relief Long provides, even if this isn’t strictly a comedic arc. (SPOILERS FOLLOW.)
Digging deeper (Spoilers)
This point might divide audiences, but I was into it when AJ finds the secret basement corridor in the Airbnb, which he owns and aims to liquidate in order to pay lawyer fees for a rape accusation. It’s so creepy that to lighten things up I texted my friend (who was also watching it) about the amazing square footage in this place. Then AJ pulls out a tape measure! He drools even more over the sub-basement.
Like a Tarantino work, Cregger freshly riffs on what has come before – any “X-Files” fan will think of the episode “Home,” and there’s also a pinch of recent Oscar winner “Parasite.” In darkly funny fashion, he shows how the police of Detroit are worthless in the rundown neighborhoods. Tess’ reasonably calm explanation that a man is trapped in this house with a killer might as well be delivered in a foreign language; these cops are incapable of (or uninterested in) hearing her.
The paperwork might say AJ owns the house, but the owner from decades earlier never left; he dug in deeper (literally). Good luck getting him to leave. Are parts of the Motor City truly totally lawless like this in 2022? Cregger effectively paints a portrait of such a place.
“Barbarian” draws from many old and new horror traditions, but its dominant categorization (along with last year’s “Don’t Breathe 2”) might be “contemporary dystopia.” It portrays a bleak future – as it exists now. At least in Detroit.