‘You’re Next’: Yuppies face some cuts in dark and funny indie horror
August 23, 2013
A bunch of well-to-do yuppies head off to a remote manse for a family reunion of sorts. Dad’s recently retired and made millions as the head of marketing for a defense contractor (isn’t the market the government?). The renovation of the aging structure is supposed to be his golden years’ project, but things in the woods aren’t so idyllic. His eldest sons, the uber-yup (Joe Swanberg, whose upcoming directorial effort, “Drinking Buddies” is an indie must-see) and the doughy academic (A.J. Bowen), are continuously, and ideologically, at each other’s throats. Along too are the younger sister and brother, and all have wives or SOs, but they mostly don’t matter – they’re all primarily fodder for a group of animal-masked marauders who mysteriously show up and pick apart the family one by one, starting with the opening salvo of crossbow bolts.
Cellphones naturally don’t work (though the reason why is solid) and each swing of a creaky door yields either a booby trap, knife-wielding psychopath or false alarm gasp from the audience.
As boilerplate as the plot is, the sense of dread and the motive why drives the film. The production values are low and the acting flat with the exception of Swanberg and Sharni Vinson as the prof’s demurring tag-along who grew up in a survivalist compound in Australia. She’s a can-doer and the wrench that puts a grind in the killers’ grand scheme. The script by Simon Barrett (of the cult-horror collaborative “V/H/S”) offers some dark and funny barbs, both at the dinner table as siblings feud over trite matters and at the moments of macabre demise. The direction too by Adam Wingard (another “V/H/S” alum, along with Swanberg) is competent and boosts some adroit twists, but as with most slasher fare, there are plenty of WTF moments.
“Next” isn’t on par with the original 1972 “The Last House on the Left,” which is still the gold standard in home-invasion thrill-kill rides, but a cut above most. Sometimes DIY love on the low trumps a studio hack, especially when it’s a film about hacks.
To underscore that, and for anyone who’s of the mindset that we’re beyond the Civil Rights era and affirmative action and that opportunity is out there for all to take on equal terms, sit through “Lee Daniels’ The Butler” and see if you still feel that way. Perhaps the best way to describe “The Butler” is as a short, painful history of the black man in America. The film centers on one, who grew up basically a slave in the early 1900s and went on to serve eight presidents as a staff server in the White House. 
The plot moves like whiplash. L.A. is now a wasteland reminiscent of the South African ghettos that the wayward aliens in “District 9” inhabited and the rich reside on the lush, luxury ring-world (thank you Larry Niven!) of the title that’s just a 20-minute shuttle ride up into the sky. Up there, universal health care is a reality, they have medi-pods that can heal anything from cancer to the clap. They can even rebuild your face should it get shot off – if your brain still works. But to get a medi-pod to heal, you must be a barcoded citizen of Elysium; if you live on Earth, you’re living in the new third world and there’s no grand social program to cover your ass. 
For those not in the know, Linda Lovelace (born Linda Boreman) was the first adult performer to become a household name and regular punchline for Johnny Carson and other late-night talk show hosts as the free-love ’60s melted into the commercialism of the ’70s. Part of that was because she was simply the star of one of the first adult films with high-quality production values and (ahem) a plot – one in which Lovelace’s ingénue can’t find her clitoris because it’s in the back of her throat. The film caught fire (it would make $600 million, and all Lovelace got was $1,250). Hugh Hefner (played with avuncular smarm by James Franco) was a fan, Lovelace got the red carpet treatment and some even embraced the film as an anthem of female sexual liberation. But behind closed doors was a different story – one of abuse at the hands of Lovelace’s husband, Chuck Traynor. 
The head trip objective runs the narrative arc fairly straight up, with a few scatological sprinkles and moronic lunacy along the way. In most every scene, Jamie’s shrieking hubris consumes the screen, and it doesn’t help that he can’t speak Spanish. As far as the project’s origins, you can almost see director Sebastián Silva and Cera cooking it up after coming down from an altered state: “Hey man, all we need is an investor or your indie famous mug on Kickstarter.” One-time child star Gaby Hoffman checks in as the title character continually at odds with Jamie. She’s a true free spirit, exemplified resoundingly as she drinks cocktails with the boys in the buff. Jamie, who sees her as an interloper, tells her to cover up, but no one else cares. So goes the movie. She’s tuned in, in touch and can speak the language; he’s just an ugly American. That’s the trip. 
At 2 a.m. New Year’s Day in 2009, Oscar Grant, a 22-year-old black man, was shot and killed by a transit cop as he lay face down and partially restrained on the platform of the subway stop of the title. It was a tragic end to a buoyant and hopeful evening as Oscar and his friends tried to make their way back to Oakland, Calif., from a sojourn across the Bay to see the fireworks. 
Given the “cool” factor, it’s no surprise that the immortal mutant with a metal-reinforced skeleton and rapier-sharp retractable blades in his wrists got his own franchise. The first installment, “X-Men Origins: Wolverine” didn’t exactly wow, but backstory up ’til “last we left off” tends to do that. Here in “The Wolverine” we’re post the last X-Men chapter (”X-Men: The Last Stand”) and Logan is living (and looking) like a vagrant in the Yukon and depressed about the death of his beloved Jean Grey (Famke Janssen, who comes to him in dream sequences). He’s got a grizzly bear as neighbor, but before we get to all that, there’s the important rewind back to Nagasaki during World War II when Logan saves one of his captors from “the bomb.” That benefactor went on to become a wealthy industrialist and now, on his deathbed, would like Logan to pay him one final visit. 
And while the arc, ambiance and elements of the films bear many similarities, the context and articulation could not be further apart. Mads Mikkelsen, whom most U.S. viewers know as Hannibal Lecter in the self-titled NBC TV series or the European badass who bashed in Bond’s balls in “Casino Royale,” plays Lucas, a quiet man trying to gain some degree of custody of his teen son in the aftermath of a bitter divorce. 
In “Drive,” the story was rooted with a true antihero who comes to the aid of the hapless family next door, a simple setup that played out in the darkest recesses of the black and white spectrum. Here, though, there’s not a true right and just corner. Those who seemingly mete out justice by disemboweling others later prove to be morally ambiguous and perhaps even the face of evil. 
For What it's Worth 