‘Happy Death Day’ is the horror movie we’re all desperate for
By Alexis Ancel // Editor in Chief
For anyone like myself who is afraid of the dark and scares a little too easily, the month of October is never safe. It’s nearly impossible to turn on the TV without some horror movie commercial ready to jolt you into the Halloween spirit with more clowns, blood and evil dolls than I ever signed up for. But this year, there’s a movie that can satisfy all audiences no matter what your terror-tolerance may be.
“Happy Death Day” follows college student Tree Gelbman, played by Jessica Rothe, as she relives the same day over and over again—her birthday, of all days. If this story sounds a little too familiar, it should. It’s been used and abused by countless movies and TV shows since “Groundhog Day” premiered in 1993. But while Bill Murray was the first to enter and escape this time warp, “Happy Death Day” is unique for one specific reason: it’s the first ever “Groundhog Day” plot to be made into a horror film. Tree not only has to relive the same day, but she is repeatedly murdered at the end of every single day until the clock resets and starts the day over again. She has to quickly learn who she can and cannot trust, and it’s only when she figures out who is killing her that she can live to see tomorrow.
The challenge with turning this plot into a thriller seems fairly obvious: how will the viewer be scared if they know exactly how each day is going to end? The biggest potential pitfall with a movie like this is boring the viewer with each passing kill, a pitfall avoided by skipping the scare entirely once repeated the murders lost their initial terror (find a better word). Around day four or five when the kills were starting to feel predictable, the tone switched and they used this predictability to create comedy instead, which made for a pleasant contrast in between murders. Once you’ve been murdered seven or eight times, I can imagine it would get pretty old. If you have to hit restart at the end of every single day anyway, why wouldn’t you have a little fun with it?
This isn’t to say that the film doesn’t have faults or clichés. There’s always the inevitable romance that somehow develops over the course of a single day (albeit many times), and it’s almost expected that Tree will emerge from her time loop experience as a changed person. But to be honest, this film is such a refreshing change from the usual “Groundhog Day” trope that it’s hard to really care. The romance with Carter never feels contrived, and every time Tree is stabbed, drowned or blown up, she comes back new and improved enough that you feel a little guilty for applauding her killer on day one.
“Happy Death Day” isn’t a movie that will keep you awake at night. In fact, the film actually feels more like an episode of a crime show. You’ll probably jump a few times, but you’re not really watching it for the adrenaline rush. Your real investment is in figuring out who the mystery murderer is, which makes the twist at the end that much more jaw dropping.
Even for those not typically a fan of the horror genre, “Happy Death Day” is the perfect movie to start with. It’s scary enough to make you scream once or twice, but not enough to make you afraid to walk to the bathroom with the lights off. Lately it’s hard to find a horror film devoid of cheap jump scares and predictable endings, let alone a time loop trope that doesn’t tell the exact same story as all the rest, but “Happy Death Day” manages to do both. Don’t judge a book by its cover, and don’t judge a movie by its title. “Happy Death Day” may not be winning Oscars, but it’s the horror film we all need this fall season.