"The game is real. Wherever you go, whatever you do, it will find you."
There seems to be an increased reliance on gimmicks when it
comes to horror movies now, particularly within bad horror movies because the
fact that their plot was written around a premise becomes abundantly clear. I
think it’s with the intent to draw in a younger audience by crafting a horror
movie around something that they can relate to. Every teenager has played truth
or dare at some point right? (if you haven’t then just be thankful). At this
point I honestly wouldn’t be surprised if we get a ‘Never Have I Ever Movie’.
Olivia, Lucas and a group of their college friends travel to
Mexico for one last getaway before graduation. While there, a stranger
convinces one of the students to play a seemingly harmless game of truth or
dare with the others. Once the game starts, it awakens something evil a demon
which forces the friends to share dark secrets and confront their deepest
fears.
Actually since typing that introduction I remembered that
there was a whole sequence within ‘Unfriended’ that used Never Have I Ever as
the premise for a sequence that was apparently supposed to be scary but in all
honesty just came off as ridiculous. That being said if you thought that was
ridiculous then ‘Truth Or Dare’ will expose you to entirely new levels of
stupidity masquerading as a horror film. It’s a rare kind of horror film that
is so inept that I almost want to recommend it.
What makes ‘Truth Or Dare’ uniquely bad is that the
screenplay or narrative in of themselves are not horrendously awful. Make no
mistake they are still contrived, formulaic and as logic defying as any
terrible slasher. But they are not bizarre enough on their own to make this
movie feel enjoyably terrible. That is due to the execution which just feels so
awkward and meandering in how it tries to convey any mood or information to the
audience.
Even the establishing scenes which have the goal of
introducing the characters and environment more than evoking any sense of fear,
still come across as woefully misguided. The actors are so often filmed in
awkward close ups that just come across as jarring rather than uncomfortable.
This alone would not be enough to ruin a movie, but the particular directorial
choices made during this first act manage to highlight the other awful aspects
of the movie.
Think of it as a snowball effect. Bad acting makes already
awful dialogue sound even more artificial, which is then highlighted by the
contrived and awkward style of direction, which are subsequently edited in a
manner that draws even more attention to them. In the first act of ‘Truth Or
Dare’ I can’t recall any basic establishing shots or even a simple shot/reverse
shot. Many filmmakers within the horror genre have used more unconventional
methods of shooting to evoke an unsettling atmosphere but the effective
examples of that have strong casts and screenplays to work with. In this case
it just comes across as painfully superficial.
The whole thing is only made more hilarious due to how
blatantly obvious it is that the movie was written by people attempting to
pander towards younger audiences with absolutely no understanding of youth
culture. If someone my age started talking in the same way as some of the
characters in this movie then I would instantly have to assume something
supernatural was taking place due to how stilted it is. The fact that the
characters stating this dialogue are all superficial blank slates whose behaviour
and motivations change constantly throughout the movie creates a cast that is
so inconsistent in their dynamic and actions that I defy anyone to describe any
of their personalities.
The weak way in which the characters are written almost
makes me hesitate to criticise the cast because it’s hard to imagine anyone
elevating this material. All in all they make for what might be the least
compelling cast of characters that it’s humanly possible to conceive of. Their
dynamic at the start of the film tries to allude towards the way their interaction
develops and dictates their decisions later down the road but neither the
actors nor the screenplay possess enough nuance to make those setups not feel
painfully obvious. Then at one point the screenplay demands that the actors
pull off a more menacing persona as they become possessed which none of them
are capable of conveying either.
But these characterisations are nothing compared to the frankly
laughable attempts to induce fear within ‘Truth Or Dare’. This is a more
subjective aspect of criticising the movie but there are so many instances in
which the movie presents a visual that is supposed to be frightening but
instead elicited laughter from me. It’s hard to explain but some moments within
the film are simply hilarious. Maybe it’s the inherent ridiculousness of these
images and the way they are rendered, maybe it’s the complete commitment the
movie has on insisting that a literal ear to ear smile is immensely frightening.
Whatever the reason, the genuinely frightening moments within ‘Truth or Dare’
make it one of the least affecting horror movies in recent memory.
Lazy and uninspired in a way that makes even the more
unintentionally hilarious parts difficult to endure, ‘Truth Or Dare’ represents
all the faults of modern horror.
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