Zach Cregger, the guy from the sketch comedy group The Whitest Kids U’Know who suddenly became a horror auteur with BARBARIAN (2022), is back with his ambitious followup. Cregger has mentioned being inspired by MAGNOLIA when trying to explain what he’s doing here, which might sound kind of ridiculous, but it makes it fitting that it’s New Line Cinema putting a whole lot of faith in a promising new director. Pretty big budget, final cut, advertising based on mystery and “from the director of BARBARIAN,” and they even gave it an IMAX release! But I think their confidence is warranted.
The only thing we really knew about from the somewhat cryptic trailers is a mysterious event explained in the opening by a child narrator (reminded me of SHOGUN ASSASSIN). One night at 2:17 AM in the small town of Maybrook, Pennsylvania, seventeen kids get up out of bed, run out their front door into the night and don’t come back. The weirdest part is that they’re all in the same class, taught by Justine Gandy (Julia Garner, WE ARE WHAT WE ARE). So when she comes to school the next day only one kid is there, Alex Lilly (Cary Christopher). Since nobody can figure out what the fuck happened some of the parents, especially Archer Graff (Josh Brolin, THRASHIN’), assume Justine had something to do with it. She’s getting harassing phone calls, threatening knocks on the door at night, her car vandalized, and she has no teaching to do. Things are not going great for her. (read the rest of this shit…)
