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Article by Nathan Hurlbut
It’s wedding day as the movie Ready or Not opens, and Grace (Samara Weaving) is all set to marry Daniel Le Domas (Adam Brody) with the ceremony taking place on his wealthy family’s estate. While the wedding itself goes off without a hitch, Grace learns later that evening that there’s one final requirement. Having made their fortune in the gaming business, the Le Domas family continues to honor a tradition that a game drawn at random from a deck of cards in a mysterious box must be played before she will be fully welcomed into the family.
As midnight strikes, Grace draws the seemingly innocuous card displaying the game of hide-and-seek. Unbeknownst to her, she is completely unaware just how serious the consequences of her choice will actually be.
Of course, having revealed she grew up in a foster home and having now married into a homicidal upper crust family, there’s little doubt Grace is the character we’ll be rooting for here. Samara Weaving makes the most of this setup, radiating screen presence and character pluck as Grace proves to be a far more resilient adversary than the “skinny blonde twig” as her father-in-law Tony (Henry Czerny) describes her. As an innocent caught up in events beyond her control, Weaving delivers plenty of dramatic charm to her role, ensuring that the movie certainly works on an emotional level.
The cinematography courtesy of Brett Jutkiewicz also deserves special mention here. This wealthy family and their extravagant estate are beautifully bathed in amber hues and dark shadows as if a visual embalming process has already taken place. Meanwhile, Samara Weaving is frequently given the visual spotlight in Grace’s torn wedding gown and Converse sneakers. It allows her character to practically glow onscreen in comparison, making Weaving’s impressive performance stand out all the more.
What’s surprising is how funny the movie is. Co-directors Matt Bettinelli-Olpin and Tyler Gillett appear just as interested in creating darkly comic moments as they are in delivering genuinely horrific ones. The ineptitude of the Le Domas family as a whole serves as a continuous punch line. It delivers a healthy dose of satire as this wealthy family may be adept with money matters, yet have few real life skills at their disposal.
The drug-addicted Emilie (Melanie Scrofano) is perhaps the most pointed example of this. Her personal incompetence results in more than one “friendly fire” deaths that are both surprising and entertaining. It isn’t long before you assume her family will eventually removing any weapons from her disposal in an act of pure self-preservation. Meanwhile the arguing between family members about what constitutes tradition and fair play in their twisted game is just one hilarious display of their serious dysfunction as a family, making for a highly entertaining dynamic.
Perhaps the film’s screenplay by Guy Busick and R. Christopher Murphy does suffer from a degree of over-plotting. Constantly shifting allegiances and surprise twists become a bit much here as the film careens towards its bloody finale. However, it does keep the movie’s pace moving at an especially rapid clip, ensuring that your interest will never waver. This is all the more impressive considering how little the movie relies on your typical horror movie clichés such as extended chase scenes to keep things moving along. The filmmakers here are just as likely to indulge in amusingly talky scenes of family members and their incessant bickering as their potential fate looms directly in front of them, delivering as much amusing satire as actual horror.
Don’t get me wrong, there’s enough gore and gross out humor here to fill your typical horror movie, especially when Grace falls into the family’s “goat pit” cellar and discovers her potential fate. However, the bloodshed is played as much for laughs as scares here, a quality that reaches its peak in the film’s hilariously over-the top climax.
This climactic moment also suggests, however, that the filmmakers pulled their punches at the last moment in their satirical aims. They opt more for a rousing violent climax rather than a thoughtful commentary on the devastating effects of group hysteria and class conflict. At the same time, there’s no denying that the film’s lunatic scenario has been leading in this direction all along, and it ends things on a distinct high point that is certainly emotionally satisfying. If anything, Ready or Not succeeds at bringing the term “class warfare” to a new, rewardingly visceral level.
Rated R.