- Directed by Craig Johnson
- Written by Kent Sublette
- Stars Nik Dodani, Brandon Flynn, Brian Cox, Edie Falco, Lisa Judrow, Dean Norris
- Run Time: 1 Hour, 34 Minutes
- Trailer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fn-hc0yf3MY
Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone
This is a very funny take on an awkward family get together with an excellent cast. After it gets going, we get to see some horror elements as a bonus. It’s very well made and a lot of fun.
Spoilery Synopsis
It’s 1983, and Jamie and Allie argue with their mother. “Hate you kids.” then something in the basement grabs and eats the mother. Jamie goes downstairs, and it gets him as well. As Allie walks through the house, all the wallpaper peels off the walls. The monster gets her too.
We cut to Rohan and Josh driving down the road, talking about cats. They’re on the way to a huge rental house where all their parents are going to meet. Josh says his parents are normal, and Rohan is jealous of that.
They arrive at the house and meet Brenda, who tells them about a big fire in the 80s. The house has been empty since, and she’s the caretaker. She’s very weird. Sara calls on the phone and warns Rohan not to propose to Josh this weekend.
Rohan’s wealthy adoptive parents arrive. Frank and Sharon awkwardly meet Josh. Liddy and Cliff, Josh’s parents, arrive next, and they’re more working class. They brought three little yap-yap dogs.
Someone we don’t see shakes a snowglobe with a miniature of the house inside, and it starts to snow for real at the house. The parents are all annoying, and it’s very awkward for the young gay couple. Josh eats some funny gummies, and he no longer cares about the parents.
Dinner is comically awkward as well, Josh doesn’t help. It soon becomes a weird singalong. Everyone complains about the flaky wifi. The wifi password, when read aloud, apparently summons some kind of creature.
Everyone turns in for the night, but they all hear bumping and grinding from the next bedroom. Everyone hears it, all three couples. None of them are doing the bumping or the grinding. We cut to a person with no mouth banging his head against the wall downstairs.
Sara shows up out of the blue, which annoys Rohan. Frank reads the wifi password and wanders down to the basement to reset the router. A clawed hand reaches out for him, and he takes it.
In the morning, everyone convenes for breakfast. They all hint about the noises during the night and wonder about Frank being absent. Sara comes in, and everyone hates her immediately. Frank walks into the room, and he’s… different. Frank cuts Josh with the big knife by accident– twice. The resulting screams wind up killing one of the little dogs.
Everyone argues later until Frank walks into the room, completely naked and proud of it. This is followed by lots of vomiting, and Frank doesn’t know what happened. One of the little dogs eats some of the puke and his eyes start to glow.
The romantic, fun weekend is not going well for anyone. Frank has a talk with the demon who already possesses him. Josh and Rohan argue about each other’s behavior until they see a crazy weird monstrous woman standing in the corner before vanishing.
Sara goes into the basement, looking for a snow shovel, and finds some photos as well as Jaime from the 80s down there, who’s now a ghost zombie. He chases her outside and then vanishes.
Everyone knows something is going on, but none of it makes sense. Sara has photos of the pre-zombie family who used to live there. She also finds Allie’s book on demonology and Andras in particular. They all decide that Allie must have summoned a demon, and now it’s in Frank.
Sharon takes some food to Frank, who asks her to kill him. Things get crazy from there, and now no one doubts that there’s a demon in Frank. They lock the monster in a bedroom, and everyone talks about their feelings in this situation. It’s all very heartwarming until the little demon dog attacks Liddy.
Josh and Rohan walk to the nearby neighbor’s house– it’s Brenda. She knows all about the demon, but didn’t think the wifi thing was going to work. She explains the story with Allie, Jamie, and her mother. Brenda was into the occult and got Allie into the scene. “What if we conjure a demon?” Things went badly after that.
The warm moon is out, the snow is suddenly gone, and Brenda is doing a ritual to bring Andras out. Rohan goes inside and talks to the zombies, who have been trying to help. Rohan goes outside to confront Frank and Brenda, and he volunteers to be a host for the monster. It starts to leave Frank to go into him, and Josh is supposed to shoot Rohan once it’s in him, but he can’t do it. Josh invites it into him instead. Soon, they’re all doing it in a circle. The demon doesn’t know what to do and splits up into multiple parts before manifesting in person. Frank himself stomps the weakened demon-bird to death.
The next morning, everyone, including Brenda watches as Josh asks Rohan to marry him. Frank apologizes for being a rotten father to Rohan. They see the three zombies and the one dead dog outside, and dead-Allie flips off Brenda before they all vanish.
Brian’s Commentary
It’s all very real and very awkward until the demon shows up. It’s still hilarious after that, but takes a more horror-centric approach.
What happened to Kate the dog? The dog just sorta vanished after Sara arrived and didn’t appear until the end.
The creature at the end, as well as the zombies, really aren’t much to look at. This one is all about the excellent cast, a bunch of familiar faces you’ve seen before. Brian Cox must have had a ball doing this after Succession ended– it’s very different.
And good. It’s very funny!
Kevin’s Commentary
This was even funnier than I expected, with a cast that all looked like they were having a good time. Even when the horror elements kick in. There was a surprisingly low body count for the situation they were in. It would have been a perfect setting to have the characters getting gradually killed off until there was a survivor or two at the end. It wasn’t that kind of movie, and it was fun seeing that for a change.
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