'Barbarian' A Review

 Barbarian is a horror movie about Tess(Georgina Campbell) who books an Airbnb in Detroit as she's there for a job interview. To her surprise the house is in a rundown/mostly abandoned neighborhood and is double booked. After some trepidation she and Keith(Bill Skarsgård) decide to share it for the night. But the house holds more secrets than meets the eye!

Campbell puts in commendable effort, giving a good performance with a role that frequently strains credulity. Skarsgård is always nice to see, his equally natural and unsettling screen presence is a nice addition to any movie, but it feels a bit like stunt casting(particularly coming off his turn as Pennywise), really kind of hammering home the creepy v. sincere dynamic that the first of many turns hinges on. It is great to see Justin Long who not only maintains his comedic bonafides but gives the role surprising, topical dimension. And he's a huge asshole, not something we typically see from him.

Visually the movie is crisp, switching from hand-held to POV to static shots, it gives it a nice fluidity and immersive quality. There's also a brashness to the editing which is exciting, at times drastically pulling us away from the action only to inexorably pull us back(like the protagonist herself). 

There are some problems, there are multiple actions taken by Tess which are huge asks to believe that eclipse the horror trope of the person going into the place they shouldn't. The way the character is presented, she is too smart and savvy to get into the situation which really kicks off the plot, but once she's there(if you can get past that) the story really starts rolling. There's also a focus on making some socio-political commentary which doesn't exactly work, there's simply too many balls in the air for that one to really land. It's an interesting effort, ambitious, but the already good movie would be better if some of that was streamlined.

An exciting, engaging, if not flawless genre flick.

Currently in theaters, coming soon to VOD.

See It.