NEW YORK (OSV News) – The soul-deadening platter of splatter “Thanksgiving” (Sony) is intended as a comedic homage to exploitation horror films of the past. So there’s abundant blood, many different ways to kill, maim and disembowel victims, gory sight gags and the occasional self-referential quip.
The movie is based on the mock trailer by director Eli Roth that was included in the 2007 film “Grindhouse.” It was accompanied by the tag line, “White meat. Dark meat. All will be carved.”
The slicing and dicing comes as the result of a drive for revenge. This has something to do with a deadly tragedy at a big-box store when Black Friday customers were trampled to death in an ugly stampede as the doors were opened.
Flash forward a year and a group of feckless, foul-mouthed teens in Plymouth, Massachusetts – along with some other locals – are being pursued by a serial killer disguised, complete with pilgrim hat, as Mayflower passenger John Carver, the area’s onetime colonial governor. Along with his costume, the predator is equipped with an ax, some power tools and other deadly gear.
Jessica (Nell Verlaque), the daughter of the store owner, is the nimblest and most imaginative of the intended victims, and so can hold her own as bodies sometimes explode around her. Patrick Dempsey is Sheriff Newlon, who proves utterly ineffectual as the corpses stack ever higher.
The flick’s defining moment comes when a pop-up turkey timer is jammed into the neck of a woman who has been roasted alive.
There are subplots designed to keep the audience guessing the killer’s identity, but speculation is not the intended activity. The idea is to cheer each killing as though it were a gymnastics stunt. The whole enterprise amounts to a coarse exercise in devaluing human life.
The film contains pervasive gory violence, cannibalism, abuse of dead bodies, a vengeance theme and relentless rough and crude language. The OSV News classification is O – morally offensive. The Motion Picture Association rating is R — restricted. Under 17 requires accompanying parent or adult guardian.
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