Happy Death Day is OBVIOUSLY terrible. Nobody reading this actually thought it was going to be a surprisingly great film. You've seen the trailer. You've called it Groundhog Day with murder. You know what you're getting into when you go to see it... as did I. But, I'm here to just confirm your preconceptions of the film. It's terrible. Now, I went and saw it alone, so I'm not exactly sure what kind of terrible it is. For me, alone, it was an eye-rolling, cliché-filled trash heap. But, on the other hand, it might've been SO bad that going with a group of people could actually be so bad it's unintentionally funny and you might have a good time. Whatever kind of bad the movie is shouldn't really matter, though. Because there's no reason you should actually be going to see this movie. If you have any sort of desire to go to the movies to see something resembling horror... just go see IT again.
Happy Death Day tells the repetitive tale of Tree (Jessica Rothe), who is a spoiled, petty, unrelenting sorority asshole. She wakes up in the bed of Carter (Israel Broussard), the film's only likable character, with no memory of how she got there other than "she was wasted last night", believing she had slept with Carter, a guy she'd never met until this morning-- it is later revealed that they did not, in fact, sleep together because there are actual good people in the world (though we never get the full explanation of why she's not wearing pants). It is also Tree's birthday, something she resents as much as her roommate, another good person, who only wants to create peace in the dorm room. She's also having an affair with her British science(?) professor, ignores her father's calls and ditches the birthday dinner he waits for her at, she ostracizes everyone who tries to even just wave at her, and is generally a garbage human. However, at the end of the day, a stalker in a mask murders Tree with a knife. If only this were the end of the film. No, Tree wakes up in the same spot she'd been in the previous morning having to re-live the day over and over again until she solves her own murder.
If it wasn't such a blatant rip-off, it might actually be a decent premise, but that would take a lot of factors such as competent directing, a solid script, and capable actors. The film is very limited when it comes to these aspects. The film suffers right off the bat with its lead-- Tree is an insufferable character who you enjoy watching get killed more than anything else that she does. (I mean, come on, her name is Tree.) I understand in movies like this, the day only stops repeating when the main character has learned a lesson and made a major change in their life. Phil Connors in Groundhog Day is an asshole, but he's only an asshole because he's tired and disenchanted with life. He's also got an actual quirky personality. And he's also Bill Murray. Tree is a young, spoiled "mean girl" with nearly no reason to be as terrible as she is. When she finally does go through the "oh, I should actually be a good person" moment, it isn't earned and it comes out of nowhere. What's great, too, is during one of the days she makes amends with almost everyone she has wronged-- the day repeats yet again, thus undoing everything she'd accomplished.
The other part of the movie that really got me consistently shaking my head is the dialogue. For some reason, Happy Death Day fills its entire movie with lines from actors that the writer THINKS would come out of college students' mouths. They also have a very 80s Hollywood view of what happens on an actual college campus. It's one cliché after another... so much so that I was predicting lines before they were even said. Tree and Carter sit in front of a window with a cupcake and a candle a la Sixteen Candles and he asks her what she wished for. Yup. You already know what she says. If you thought "tomorrow", you win the jackpot. College, also, is still apparently made up of cliques, good-looking male rapists, fraternity hazing, and protesting global warming snowflakes. It's clunky and hackneyed dialogue and stock characters that really bring down the movie (there's even a fart joke-- I'm not kidding). I caught myself wondering when they were going to shut the hell up and get killed already. It creates so many questions that take you right out of the "plot" of the movie. Why is Tree such an asshole? Why did they cast a guy who looks like he should be playing Elijah Wood's future self as her father? Why does she wait until the very end of the second day to realize everything has happened exactly the same? Why is the professor a British guy who only looks to be three or four years older than Tree? And so on.
It's also not scary. Most of it is Tree being a dick a bunch of times leading up to her murder. There's a few jump scares, but nothing truly suspenseful enough to get the heart racing. I will give the movie three compliments, however. One, I was actually a little surprised at the reveal of the killer. I thought they were going to go obvious with it and it actually kind of worked (however, the motive of the killer is AWFUL). Two, Israel Broussard's character Carter really is the only likable character and moral center of the film. It's just unfortunate he has a character like Tree to become his love interest. And finally, props to the movie for actually mentioning out loud that what's happening to Tree "is a lot like Groundhog Day". It was impressive they had the balls to make connection. It's like plagiarizing a paper that deals with the subject of plagiarism. You have to at least respect the meta irony.
Look, there's a right way and a wrong way to recreate the Groundhog Day formula because no matter how you do it, it's always going to be compared. Edge of Tomorrow was the right way to do it. Before I Fall and now Happy Death Day are examples of the wrong way to do it. As much as I advise you NOT to see this movie, I'm actually happy it's doing well in the box office money wise. Producer Jason Blum who has now made a successful career of producing cheap and mostly great horror movies deserves his success and we don't want a shit show like Happy Death Day to put an end to it. Let's just focus more on movies like Paranormal Activity, Insidious, Split and Get Out.
D
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