Monday, October 3, 2016

Most Likely to Die Movie Review – The Best High School Reunion Ever






Runtime: 90 minutes
Release Date: April 25, 2016
Rating: NR?
Director: Anthony DiBlasi

Ashley is your classic high school popular girl who still thinks she's in high school. She landed the hot hockey player who just recently got cut from the NY Rangers and is less than happy about it. Since the two made plans to host some of their former classmates the night before their big reunion though, she tries to cheer him up on the way to his remote beach house where he's waiting for her. She arrives, puts on the smallest graduation robe I've ever seen, and follows a series of notes around the house that she thinks he left for her. The notes actually come from a killer who stalks her through the house before killing her.

Not long after, the other guests begin arriving. Gaby became a professional poker player who somehow plays professionally despite choking on big hands and having huge tells. She's not too happy to learn that Brad, the high school boyfriend who dumped her and became a big star, is coming. Nor is she happy when he shows up with his supermodel new girlfriend. There's also the girl most likely to succeed, the guy who was the class clown, and Freddie, who was/is gay, later became an alcoholic, wound up in jail, and broke parole to hang out with his old friends. Jake Busey even pops up as Tarkin, the former owner of the town's liquor store who sold alcohol to minors, later lost his job, and is now the caretaker of the house.

Not long after arriving, they talk about something bad that they did years ago. It's super confusing, but the gist is that they defaced a kid's picture in the yearbook. They also did some other stuff to him I guess, but the school recalled the yearbook, which featured his face scratched out and most likely to die beneath it. The kid was so depressed that he moved to San Francisco with his mom, and rumor says that he later killed himself. This is really all just exposition that leads up to the moment when the killer finally strikes.

This killer is one of the best I've seen in recent years. Instead of running around with a ton of weapons, he primarily uses his graduation cap, which has a thin and super sharp razor along the edge. Literally, what can you say about a film that shows a killer killing someone by slamming the corner of his graduation cap into the center of her forehead multiple times as blood spurts out? Or when someone gets a utility knife right across the eyes? My roommate came down in the middle of one death scene and kind of just stood to one side to watch what happened, then went upstairs and probably added it to his own Netflix queue.

And yes, there were moments/scenes you know are coming. You know that as soon as Brad sees Gaby that he'll somehow realize he doesn't love his supermodel girlfriend because he's still in love with her and that they'll wind up together. Though honestly, who wouldn't fall in love with Heather Morris? You also know that two other characters will wind up in bed together because they conveniently had a crush on each other in high school.

It's even pretty easy to figure out who the killer is, if you pay enough attention. I had a theory in mind that it would end like the original Scream and have two different killers, but I was completely wrong. I don't recommend movies a lot, but I definitely recommend Most Likely to Die. It gets my nod as the top horror film of the month and one that may be hard to beat.

No comments:

Post a Comment