“Thanksgiving” promises “there will be no leftovers.” If you believe that, you haven’t noticed how modern horror films let not only the Final Girl but also most of her friends and family survive. It’s also an inappropriate tagline because “Thanksgiving” entirely consists of dishes served up by previous slashers, gore-horror and torture-porn; this is a celebration of leftover tropes.
I do give director Eli Roth – who devised the story with Jeff Rendell, who wrote the screenplay – credit for finally making this film, which he teased with a fake trailer in 2007’s “Grindhouse.” His heart isn’t quite in it; he shows more passion when talking about classic horror in “Eli Roth’s History of Horror.”
But “Thanksgiving” has enough well-devised moments – mostly in the realm of gore, plus some commentary about rabid consumerism (we get one-liners like “We’re all gonna be 50 percent off”) – that it’s better than going hungry.
“Thanksgiving” (2023)
Director: Eli Roth
Writers: Jeff Rendell (screenplay, story), Eli Roth (story)
Stars: Patrick Dempsey, Nell Verlaque, Jalen Thomas Brooks
As with the other post-“Grindhouse” films to come from those fake trailers – the “Machete” duology and “Hobo with a Shotgun” – Roth and cinematographer Milan Chadima don’t bother with scratchy film or other grindhouse trappings; they shoot it straight-up. It does feel like Thanksgiving time in the modest New England town, at least.
It doesn’t grind out an old-school vibe
One gets a sense that going full grindhouse isn’t worth the effort to them. There’s some passion in the beginning, though, as Roth sends up insane human behavior on Black Friday – which, let’s face it (one character points out), starts on Thanksgiving now. A crowd bigger than a Taylor Swift audience fills the parking lot outside Walmart stand-in RightMart. The gore and violence in the ensuing stampede is worth the wait, even if the cheap toaster oven isn’t.
Then “Thanksgiving” narratively becomes “I Know What You Did Last Summer,” but if you think that Fourth of July film is overrated, you might soon find it’s a comparative masterpiece of storytelling logic and character growth.
The masked Pilgrim is killing people who had something to do with the riot. Basically, that means they were there. The “teen” (20- or 30-something actors, of course) targets react to this unfairness in a mostly blank-faced manner.
They’re led by Jessica (Nell Verlaque, a placeholder of similar “I don’t want to be here” blandness to the new “Screams’ ” Melissa Barrera). She’s by far the most likable character, by default. Her best friend is Gabby, whose significance to the events is so inconsequential that it’s like Addison Rae (“He’s All That”) won the role in a raffle. It’s rare that a high-billed actress is just there, without a personality or arc.
OK, so the characters are less filling than a turkey TV-dinner, but maybe that’s just how slashers are. Roth and his fans know the kills are the gourmet feast. I won’t go into spoiler territory, but suffice it to say that a setup of a dinner scene makes the one from “Texas Chain Saw Massacre” look like a pleasant family gathering.
Pitch-black humor kicks in
When the film gets closer to death, it comes alive. It’s possible that sheer shock value (or anticipation of shock value) allowed me to get through these 106 minutes despite not caring about any of the characters.
The director’s pitch-black sense of humor is required to drive “Thanksgiving” on its own, though. And it’s not quite enough, because this is unfortunately a 2023 film, not a 1973 film or even a 1983 film. Those creatively vicious killings make Roth’s film stand out from the current slasher pack (even if he’s not on his A-game), but only in the abstract. There will be as many leftovers as in the last “Scream” movie.
And the revelation of the mysterious killer (not that there’s much chance to solve it; you might as well pick a name out of a hat) makes so little psychological sense that even a decent performer doesn’t come close to selling it.
“Thanksgiving’s” need to be R-rated rather than unrated stops it from being pure nightmare fuel. And the psychological-horror aspects might have you laughing more so than crying. As such, we have a gore-horror film that (perhaps accidentally) coddles the viewer and assures us everything will be all right in the end. That might be a good human value (or at least a survival mechanism), but it’s not a trait of a great horror movie.