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Film: There’s Someone Inside Your House
Year: 2021
Director: Patrick Brice
Writer: Henry Gayden
Starring: Sydney Park, Théodore Pellerin and Asjha Cooper
Review:
This is a movie that I heard about through an October movie challenge. It was a bonus watch and I thought the premise sounded interesting enough. Plus, it was a 2021 release as well. Aside from that, I didn’t know a lot about this movie which is my preferred way of coming in. The synopsis for this movie is the graduating class at Osborne High is being targeted by a masked assailant; intent on exposing the darkest secret of each victim and only a group of misfit outsiders can stop the killings.
We start this movie with Jackson Pace (Marian Tarasiuk) coming home. He has a game later that day and trying to get a nap in before. He is on the phone with his best friend, Macon Bewley (Zane Clifford). There is an egg timer on the island of the kitchen and Jackson calls out to his family. No one answers though. Jackson relays his plan to Macon to get him off the phone.
When he wakes up, it is dark. His phone is gone and the timer is sitting next to him where it was. He panics and runs downstairs. The front door is open and his truck is gone. When he goes into the kitchen to call the police, he finds a picture of him along with his teammates hazing another. It is Caleb Greeley (Burkely Duffield) who turns out to be gay. There are more pictures that lead him to a closet where he is killed by someone wearing a mask of his face. We then cut to the football game where Jackson’s father is calling him but can’t get through. Everyone at the game then gets a video of what Jackson and the rest of the team did to Caleb, just as he scores a touchdown.
The movie then introduces us to our main characters. We have Makani Young (Sydney Park) who has a dark past herself. She is newer to this school and came here due to that incident. She had a summer fling with Ollie Larsson (Théodore Pellerin), but now that school is back in session ignores him. Alex Crisp (Asjha Cooper) is an outspoken black girl of the group. We also have Rodrigo Doran (Diego Josef). He is harboring a secret and in love with Alex, he just won’t tell her. There is Zach Sanford (Dale Whibley) who most of the school hates due to his dad buying up all the farms and being rich. Then there is Darby (Jesse LaTourette) who is transgender.
This murder rocks the community, but whoever did it isn’t done yet. His next target is Katie Koons (Sarah Dugdale). She is student council president, but we also see that she might be harboring some dark secrets herself. The killer exposes her and much like the previous death, the killer is wearing a mask of her face. This death causes the police to scramble and to get to the bottom of who is doing this before more victims are claimed.
That is where I’ll leave my recap here. Where I want to start is that we have an interesting concept here for a slasher film. We don’t get a lot of great modern slashers as it is a genre where most of the best ideas are taken. This movie knows that and uses it to its advantage to some extent. I like that we get a meta feel when Alex states that she doesn’t have a secret outside of running over a fisherman and tossing him into the ocean, of course referencing I Know What You Did Last Summer. This movie is also based off of a book so I’m wondering if that reference is in there or just giving a nod here for movie version. Moving from there, I love the long knife that is almost a machete used by the killer and the fact that the mask is ever changing to whomever the killer is targeting. I would guess a 3D printer is needed.
The reference to I Know What You Did Last Summer doesn’t stop there. We have this idea once again that people have secrets and the killer knows that. Before they are killed, they must face it. I’ve given Jackson’s, but Katie is a closet racist. Makani was part of a terrible accident in Hawaii and some of the other characters that have encounters. I like this idea. It also brings up red herrings like could it be Deputy Larsson (Andrew Dunbar) since the killer uses a taser and they can do background checks. Sheriff Adkins (Adrian Hough) is another as there are talks of disbanding the police force and Mr. Sandford (William MacDonald) bringing a private company. Alex believes it is Ollie since his brother is the deputy, giving him access to materials belonging to the police. There are more people that wonder about as well.
That idea of secrets also creates an issue for me. There are a lot of people who will hate this movie as ‘woke’ propaganda. There is a trans-person who gets bullied. We have the white girl who is spouting racist things in secret, so she gets murdered for it. It is interesting that Mr. Sandford collects Nazi memorabilia, for similar reasons. Do I believe that all of these people could live in this area and not realize it? Absolutely, but I also think that it is being overblown a little bit. This is a possiblity that all these people are in our community. For me though, it is a little bit exaggerated as well.
Where I’ll shift over to next would be the acting. Park is solid as our lead here. I did like seeing her deal with her dark past. She just wants to have a normal existence, but with the killings surrounding secrets, it would make her anxious. Pellerin is fine as our main red herring. I’m not saying this spoil, but the movie is leaning hard into him being the killer. He has a good look to make you think that. Cooper is good as our judgmental friend. Whibley is good as that rich kid that wants to be normal, but acts a bit weird to fully fit in. LaTourette is solid as our transgender character that just wants to be treated normal. Her friends do, but the rest don’t. Aside from that, I do think we are getting caricatures that are a bit over the top, but it is needed for the movie.
Then I’ll go next into the effects, cinematography and soundtrack. For the former, this movie was more brutal than I was expecting and I liked that. We get like an Achilles cut, a solid death in a confessional and there is even a sword in this. I wasn’t expecting it to go as vicious as it did which helped me enjoy this more. The cinematography is solid enough as well. I had no issues there. Then the soundtrack had some solid indie music that also worked. Overall, I’d say that I’m positive here as well.
So then in conclusion here, this is a solid enough slasher movie for me. I do think this is catering more toward the times and it feels like I Know What You Did Last Summer for the teens of today. As a fan of more adult horror, I can appreciate the kills that we got. Do I think that some of the message this movie is pushing is heavy handed? Yes, to an extent. This has a message that is relevant though still and presenting it through a slasher is a way to do that. I don’t think this is great, but I can appreciate what it is doing.
My Rating: 6.5 out of 10