Trailer Tuesday: The Cabin in the Woods

-





2012 is certainly shaping up as a great year for beloved geek icon  Joss Whedon, particularly in terms of his big screen fortunes. Of course, the biggie is that Whedon, the creator of Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Firefly, wrote and helmed The Avengers - which is out this Thursday in South Africa, and which is destined to become one of the most successful superhero films of all time. Also this year we may see Whedon's super-low budget, indie version of Shakespeare's Much Ado About Nothing, with Nathan Fillion, Amy Acker and Alexis Denisof. 

Before that though there's horror comedy The Cabin in the Woods, with Whedon sharing script duties with frequent collaborator, and Cloverfield writer, Drew Goddard.


Filmed all the way back in 2009, it's been quite a wait for The Cabin in the Woods, which was first delayed for a 3D conversion (later scrapped, thank God!) and then shelved when MGM when bankrupt. As it turns out, apparently the 3 year wait was worth it.

At first glance, The Cabin in the Woods sounds bog standard: Ignoring warnings from creepy hick locals, a group of vacationing college students (including Chris Hemsworth, Kristen Connolly and Anna Hutchison) trek off to a lakeside cabin in the middle of nowhere. There's swimming, drinking and sex. And then something awful happens.

However, as the film's trailer and cheeky tagline - "You think you know the story" - reveals, The Cabin in the Woods is far from conventional. In fact, what has most pleased critics is that the film is an enjoyably clever "Meta" play on genre expectations. Without revealing too much, someone is screwing with these kids, involving them - and the audience - in a funny, but still thrilling, deconstruction of horror films. Evidently The Cabin in the Woods is unapologetically strange stuff, but "groundbreaking" nonetheless.

The Cabin in the Woods released in the United States on 13 April, clocking up an aggregated Rotten Tomatoes rating of 91% Fresh (which personally makes me very wary of over-hype). The film's South African release date has yet to be set, but given the film's admittedly niche appeal, I think we can expect to wait a good few months for it. Personally, I'm putting money on a release date sometime between July and November.


Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Is the rebooted Lara Croft gay? Evidence for and against...

-
Image
As some of you know, I’ve been fangirling hard over the new Tomb Raider , the first entry in the video game series since 2008, and ostensibly a reboot for the entire franchise . Taking the form of an origin story, Tomb Raider 2013 depicts the events that transformed a beautiful, if bookish, archaeology graduate into a pistol-packing adventurer with a devil-may-care attitude. We meet Lara Croft as a pretty, fairly ordinary 21 year old, brooding over her work notes, listening to her mp3 player and very much confined to the shadow of her male mentors. By the end of the game, however, she’s taken charge – she’s had to! – and, battered, bruised and bloody, she’s both a survivor and hero, right down to rescuing the princess and carrying her away in her arms. Yeah, this is probably the best point to mention that there will be some Tomb Raider 2013 spoilers in this post, so read ahead with caution. Anyway, I loved the game. Technically it’s near faultless, it looks beautiful, the ov...
Read more

Lara Croft: Tomb Raider and Queer Icon (Part 4)

-
Image
Part 4: The mystery of Lara Croft’s sexuality “Now what’s a man gotta do to get that kind of attention from ya?” – Larson Conway (Tomb Raider, 1996) Despite being an icon for many queer pop culture consumers, Lara Croft’s own sexual orientation remains ambiguous. Outside of the Top Cow comics and live-action films – where Lara is blatantly heterosexual, with a fondness for slightly scruffy bad boys (who keep betraying and hurting her) – the character comes across as primarily asexual. Kurtis Trent is the only male figure who even comes close to being a love interest in the game series. Lara's apparent sexual disinterest is despite the adventurer appearing very sexually attractive herself; a figure of desire with bee-stung lips, voluptuous breasts, toned stomach and impossibly long, athlete’s legs. Yet Lara is never dominated by sexual yearnings or romantic affections. She is very much in control of herself at all times. It’s worth noting, however, that over time th...
Read more

Ladies I Love: Part 2 - Rhona Mitra

-
Image
Following on from the first post in this series , you may realise that I have a very definite type. Anyway, today we profile model-turned-actress Rhona Mitra . This 36 year old Briton is of English, Irish and Indian descent. You'll have seen her pop up on the big and small screen multiple over the past decade and a half, although Mitra's claim to fame is that she was the second ever model (some say first if you rule out "unofficial"  Nathalie Cook ) to play iconic video game character Lara Croft . From 1997-1998, Mitra could be found in PR material, as well as at trade shows, events and conventions as a flesh-and-blood embodiment of Tomb Raider 's kick-ass archeologist lead. There have been many official Lara Croft models over the years , but as far as I'm concerned Mitra remains the best. In my mind, of all of them, she most closely resembles the video game character in terms of facial features. Plus she comes from money and had a rebellious boarding...
Read more