The Cabin in the Woods. 2011. USA. Directed by Drew Goddard. Written by Joss Whedon and Goddard. With Kristen Connolly, Chris Hemsworth, Anna Hutchinson, Fran Kranz, Jesse Williams, Richard Jenkins, Bradley Whitford. 35mm. 95 min.
The Cabin in the Woods is an absurdist, Lovecraftian meta-movie in which the world’s continued existence is dependent upon a continuous program of ritual human sacrifice to appease the elder gods. As usual, five college friends arrive at a remote forest cabin with no inkling of the horrors that await them. One by one, they fall victim to backwoods zombies, but even as the body count rises, there is yet more at work here than meets the eye: a pair of technicians are manipulating the ghoulish goings-on behind the scenes. The Cabin in the Woods cleverly employs and subverts horror tropes (it has all the creatures!) in service of a rigged game upon which human survival depends—all the while tapping into the idea that an unspeakable evil lurks just below the surface of normality. In other words, our lives are fragile and precious, and we are not in control.