THE FOLLOWING REVIEW CONTAINS SPOILERS OF THE DISCUSSED FILM. READERS DISCRETION IS ADVISED.
I guess when you party too hard, people tend to show their true colors.
PLOT
Bodies Bodies Bodies shows Sophie invite her European girlfriend Bee to a party hosted at the mansion of her oldest friend David, during a hurricane. The list of guests include: David’s girlfriend Emma whose an actress, a podcaster named Alice, her older boyfriend Greg, and Sophie’s ex girlfriend Jordan. Another guest named Max (Connor O’Malley) left the party early after having a fight with David himself. Sophie’s intention to come to the party is to seek David’s help in convincing her parents to regain her allowance, after getting cut off due to multiple drug overdoses she barely survived. As she parties sober by night, she convinces everyone to play a murder in the dark style game called ‘Bodies Bodies Bodies’. The game gets out of hand fast when David acts aggressive towards Greg and argues with Emma. When the women continue the game, the power goes out as a result of the worsening storm. When they split up to find a power source, they find David actually die as his throat was slashed kukri. They all suspect Greg to be responsible since no one knows much about him. When he chooses to reciprocate their hostility once confronted, Bee would act out of self defense by killing him with a kettle bell. Starting to have doubts that Greg didn’t commit the murder, the women theorize Max is responsible because he got into a fight with David when confessing he had a crush on Emma. This situation causes Sophie to relapse and share drugs with Emma, but the latter would be found dead from a head wound next to the stairs. Unsure who to trust, start suspecting Bee to be responsible when they know nothing about her compared to Greg. As they kick her out due to being afraid, Bee would return to Sophie’s car to briefly eat. However, she would find a pair of underwear in the backseat that matches Jordan’s bra, implying that Sophie had an affair with her before attending the party. When Bee finds a way back inside the house, she spots Jordan stealing a gun that belonged to David’s father. Once inside, she demands her to reveal the gun to the remaining group. She doesn’t reveal it since she stashed it elsewhere, but instead reveals she was the killer in the original game. Bee would further prove her innocence by admitting she never went to college because she dropped out to take care of her mother, whose suffering from borderline personality disorder. Jordan’s jealousy towards the couple would lead to her holding everyone at gunpoint, thus causing them and Alice to argue. As Jordan would admit to the affair, Sophie retaliates by admitting she wouldn’t date her as her friends make her test her own sobriety. She would even top that off by saying she hate listens to Alice’s podcast. When she chooses to call out Jordan’s insecurities, the latter would act without hesitation by shooting her in the leg. Everyone would get into a fight over the gun, but it would lead to Alice getting shot in the throat. Sophie and Jordan would continue fighting up the stairs, but Bee would end that conflict by pushing the latter over the bannister. But in her dying breath, she would tell her to check Sophie’s text messages, in order to prove her infidelity. Unable to trust her girlfriend, Bee would hide from her until the storm is officially blown over by morning. Once the Sun slowly emerges, Sophie would find her and admit that she saw Emma fall down the stairs to her death. Still not trusting her, Bee still demands to see her phone’s texts. Instead, Sophie would toss it across the other side of the house outside. Both women would fight for it, but would inadvertently grab David’s phone instead. Realizing that they grabbed his phone, they find the video to prove how he died: It turns out that he accidentally slashed his throat with the kukri when trying to use it to open a wine bottle for a TikTok video, similarly to when Greg did it before the game begun. Since his death was an accident, that means there was no murderer from the start. The film would end with a now distraught Sophie and Bee seeing a confused Max return to the mansion, just when the power goes back on.
THOUGHTS
I have been lucky enough to see a whole bunch of whodunnits in my lifetime and this is nothing like the rest, which is a very good thing. Writer Sarah DeLappe and Director Halina Rejin smartly put us on the edge of out seats in unimaginable ways. It easily works technically with creative lighting and an uncomfortable score composed Disasterpeace. Even Jasper Wolfe's cinematography makes you feel part of the whole bloody experience. That alone works gets you scared shitless, which is exactly what the characters have to be feeling in their predicament. It evens naturally funny as they also don't handle the situation better than they should. The reason this movie works as hilarious yet scary goes to how smart it is when exploring a dark form of humanity that is jealousy. Whatever class you're identified with, like entitled wealth in this film's case, a part of you can't help but bring out the worst of yourself and when you choose to do that, you hang around others that won't respect you as you would think vice versa. So seeing a group of mostly spoiled adults drop like flies, it's pretty crazy to witness because as you become aware of who they are deep down, it becomes a challenge to narrow down who to root for. In this case, the only character I ended up rooting for the whole time was Bee. Maria Bakalova made her likable from beginning to end because she had zero animosity towards everyone. Instead, she only showed kindness to those who hardly did in return and went from shy to fearless by the end of the night. You definitely feel bad for her overall because by the end of the night, there will be consequences she'll bear with the one who did not deserve her. Amandla Stehlberg definitely tested our emotions with Sophie because she wants to be a better person than before, yet appears to fail without trying. Of course I felt bad for her drug addiction getting the best of her, but she is truly at her worst when she can't even be honest of her infidelity, willing to take it to the grave. Bee only found out because she found Jordan's underwear and kept choosing to confront her about it because she honesty would've made her consider working things out. Chase Sui Wonders also made it a challenge from the get go to like Emma because she's completely self centered during the whodunnit that ensued. Every time someone died before her, she tried to make it about her which was ridiculous. Her selfishness gets so out of control when she tries to kiss Sophie hours after David died. Even before things get out of hand, she was definitely out of line for her to ask Bee if Sophie was her first relationship. It is not like that shit really matters. She tried so hard to be a victim for attention's sake, it wouldn't even matter when she actually is one, which only made it ironic. I was aware that these adults lacked respect, but it's shocking how low they take it. The most neutral of characters had to be Alice. Rachel Sennott showed her off to be insecure, but gregarious enough to enjoy everyone's company. For someone who got to build a podcast, she is hilariously the most unaware person. She was the only one excited to play the game when everyone else wasn't. And I couldn't have a straight face when the only defense she had for her boyfriend was for having the zodiac sign of libra. I totally felt bad when she died because she did her best avoiding to be violent. She even stood out a lot when she had glow sticks to light her way when everyone else used their cellphones as flashlights. Aside from her, the only person I seemed to like was Greg. Lee Pace did a great job portraying the character as the only one who was acted mature for his age. Every time conflict came towards his way, he did the right thing trying to avoid it because he knew it'd be worse if he (over)reacted. And when it came to his actions by the end of his life, he was totally acting out of self defense as were the ladies, which makes the whole thing tragic. The one person I hated the most had to be Jordan. Myha'la Herrold makes it clear to not like her as her jealousy makes her the most ruthless and that aspect made her an intimidating force. She can't stand how she is as bad as she thinks she is and doesn't even try to redeem herself. Rather than doing that, she would decide to make things worse for everyone before they could get better because she wants them to feel miserable like herself. She chose to not be upfront about the gun because it was her way to have control for once and it still backfired. The fact that she lied so pathologically when shooting Alice, I couldn't help but shout "Fuck this bitch" because that was the final line I couldn't believe she would cross. So when she died too, there was no sympathy for me to give as it happened. Last but not least, Pete Davidson definitely made things interesting as David before and after his blood was spilt. It was hard to like him as he acted so immature when feeling intimidated by Greg's manliness. That insecurity is so strong for him that it only lets people see him at worst which is his rudest. He is so uncomfortable with himself that he chooses to make the others feel the same, which is where you just can't stand him. His death really brought things full circle because the truth of it was shocking yet hilarious. It's funny because he let his insecurity get the best of him and the scene calls out social media addiction with ease. It's still shocking in general because knowing he killed himself on accident means the whole movie was a whodunnit when no one had actually done it in the first place. And that is a very creative twist in the genre itself. Knowing that, you can't help feeling bad for everyone else because that meant they died for nothing. With Bee still standing (alongside Sophie), I really hope there is a way for her to overcome whatever consequences she must bear. I did have a good time with this one, but even down the line, I admit that there were moments that didn't make any sense to me. For instance, why didn't Sophie try fixing the window? I know this gives and excuse for Bee to take a breather during the chaos that goes down, but it's kind of ridiculous for it not getting fixed before the arrival of a hurricane. That was honestly dumber than her deciding to park so far away. Moving on, did Bee have to slap Sophie as hard as she did? David was definitely a warmup but since she's dating Sophie, I don't think she had to. Also, why would Jordan touch the kukri without covering her hand to avoid having her fingerprints? I then keep wondering what makes Sophie think David's dad doesn't have a gun off of political views. If the guy had a kukri, hse should've expected to find a gun. After seeing the whole movie, we know that no one killed David but if she wanted to prove her innocence, she should've been more cautious when she picked it up. I then wonder why was Greg sleeping in the middle of the indoor basketball court? There were a bunch of bedrooms and it seemed that he was sharing one with Alice, so it kinda made sense for him to be there aside from the purpose enhancing the tension. If his seasonal depression makes him want to choose when to sleep wherever, I wish Alice got to make that clear. I don't even blame Bee changing clothes because that was her way to calm down from the trauma she was experiencing, but why were the ladies allow themselves to split up? If they really wanted to avoid dying, they should've stayed together the whole night. Had that happened, it would've not been down to two people remaining. I also think they should've changed together since everyone had someone's blood on their clothing. I really didn't expect any continuity errors in the given setting, but I was beyond shook when I saw an EXIT sign in one of the hallways. If I gotta go any further, it's pretty annoying on how fast it was to turn on Bee. I know whodunnits need conflict towards everyone to keep people surprised of the twist, but I don't buy that Alice had the time to look up Utah State during a fucking Hurricane. I seriously doubt she would bother looking that up for however long during a hurricane party. The tension would've been better if she said she doesn't think Bee is honest. And even if she really did, I don't think there was a point for to wait it out on telling Sophie what she looked up. If she really wanted her back, she should've shared that shit before the game started. That honestly pissed me off more than Sophie allowing her to kick Bee out of the house. In fact it makes sense to kick Bee out at the time but since the house is huge, it would've been a fine decision to lock her in a room or a closet. I didnt want that to happen but had they done that, they would've prepared for her trying to escape. And lastly, why would Sophie grab the gun at the end? Again she didn't kill anyone personally but if she really wanted to get Bee to trust her again, she didn't have to carry it. Ignore this and you're still in for a ride. In short, Bodies Bodies Bodies is a standout film from 2022 for being a mystery that knew how to get off the rails in fashion and then some. You like whodunnits? See this now.
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