Review: The Less You Know About ‘Barbarian, The More Youll Enjoy One Of The Years Best Horror Movies
In 2007, rising genre director Edgar Wright was asked by Quentin Tarantino and Robert Rodriguez to create a parody trailer to mimic their performances. Wright replied “no”, to which a shrill voice said, “If you are thinking of entering this house, don’t! If you’re thinking of opening that door, don’t! thought to open the basement for inspection, no!” It’s funny because it’s so informative and yells at the audience’s screen, “Don’t get in there!”
It’s basically the plot of The Barbarian by Jack Kreiger, the less you know the better. In fact, consider this permission to stop reading this review now and just buy your tickets. Don’t watch the trailer, don’t read the reviews, go straight to the theater for one of the most brilliantly executed, thrilling, and downright scary horror films of the year.
How can you describe The Barbarian without giving away all the best twists? Well, it’s a triumph for what could be a new sub-genre: Airbnb horror. It all starts on a dark and rainy night when a young woman named Tess (Georgina Campbell) tries to break open a box in a rented house in Detroit she has booked for an interview the next day. The light came from within. There is someone else at home.
In a plot that shows the dangers of handing over property management to an anonymous tech company, the house is revealed to have been booked twice and Keith (Bill Skarsgård) has moved out. Despite her best instincts – like most independent women today, Tess was very cautious – she had no choice, and she decided to enter the room with him when everything calmed down.
This is the first horror film for Kroeger, who is a founding member of the comedy group U’Know Whitest Kids but is clearly a fan and newcomer to the genre, and a master of tone and horror, an exciting new horror filmmaker. Hope rises, so he gives us horror heroes who are smarter than the average scream queen, and gives us a mysterious loner (who previously played him an infamous horror monster) who actually might be a good person. .
There is a process of building and overcoming expectations repeatedly throughout the film. Kreiger slowly builds a mind-boggling, tense sequence of moments of horror that melt his face, then quickly cuts to another chapter, makes a left turn in a completely different mode, and takes us all on a rollercoaster. His comedic talent also helps with this dramatic change in tone, and The Barbarian is as funny as it is horrifying.
Tess and Kit wander through the awkward clutter of their Airbnb, but the film expands to include residents and other homeowners over the decades. Kreiger tells the story of a country house’s journey through time, a middle-class neighborhood that was run by white planes and then abandoned, eventually sold as a low-cost alternative to the short-term rental market. Rumors about what happened in this house are only known to the locals, highlighting the dangers of a fractured community suffering from exploitative capitalism and creating the perfect anonymous environment to lure tech-savvy millennials to their deaths.
Kreiger also uses The Barbarian to explore the horror genre as victim, villain, and victor, and the ways they are compromised and endowed with empathy. Deeply caring, Tess is the perfect victim, but she’s also smart, and her communication skills and ability to read other people are her biggest crime-fighting strengths. Campbell’s performance was perfectly balanced, and Kreager effectively demonstrated that it was Tess’s emotional intelligence that gave her the chance to win.
Krager transforms this layered contemporary social commentary inspired by classic horror films and tropes into a stunning and genuinely terrifying film. The attraction of a retreat, combined with fresh ideas – and plenty of scary moments – makes this a gripping new film and should be considered one of the horror films of the year.
Cathy Walsh is a film critic for the Tribune News Service.
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“wild”
Rating: R for strong violence and gore, disturbing elements, profanity and nudity.
Duration: 1 hour 43 minutes
Game: General Release Starts September 9th
