The Horror Show
Kristy
by Oliver Blackburn
I saw Kristy on one of the obligatory “Movies you may have missed in 2014” lists that’s been floating around the internet. The screenshots looked creepy and the IMDB summary was satisfying enough that I took a chance on this home invasion flick.
Did I say home invasion? Well, what I should have said was school invasion. Kristy starts us off at the undiscovered crime scene of yet another victim in a string of brutal murders plaguing a college town. All the victims fit the same bill: young, pretty, and their whole lives ahead of them. These girls are pure and live the “good life”, so in the eyes of a cult that call themselves “The Fold”, these girls are all “Kristies.”
We find out very early on that The Fold obviously has some problem with God and fortunate young girls, and the crazy followers are challenged to find and kill, “Kristy”, the followers of Christ. If they can kill Kristy, they can kill God. Simple enough, and an interesting enough premise to keep me watching.
The viewer is then taken on campus where we meet leading lady Justine (Haley Bennet) who will be unfortunately spending the Thanksgiving break alone. Her boyfriend’s family is not very fond of her, she can’t afford a plane ticket home to see her parents, and her roommate, who initially planned to spend the holiday with her, has decided last minute to meet her family in Aspen. Life pretty much sucks for Justine on Thanksgiving weekend.
This initial set up where we watch Justine interacting with her boyfriend and roommate took a little too long to wrap up. But I suppose it was necessary in order for us to feel some sort of empathy for Justine. I know I’ve been alone more than once on a holiday in my life, it’s no fun. But then we’re given a glimpse into Justine enjoying the time alone and having fun. Being alone doesn’t have to be awful. And I felt like this was a different approach, especially with the blaring pop track choice for the soundtrack, in a horror movie.
Then things start to get weird and we’re back on track when Justine goes out to the grocery store to pick up some ice cream and she runs into the mysterious Violet (Ashley Greene). Immediately I knew that Violet was bad news and she would end up being a part of the group that inevitably stalks Justine back on campus. What was super lame about it though was how generic Violet was, as if the writers were unable to flesh out a deeper, more troubled character. All they did was give her a bunch of piercings, make her pale, and have her wear a dirty hoodie. Yeah, not very exciting.
So we then get back to campus and now Violet and her gang of Fold followers have their eyes set on killing “Kristy”. Justine keeps trying to tell them, “I’m not Kristy, I’m Justine.” But these people are nuts. What’s the matter with you, Justine? You can’t reason with crazy.
That’s about all I’ll give away on the plot. Surely you can assume that this plays out just like any other cat and mouse horror film with bits of slasher mixed in, and you’d be right. But where Kristy impressed me was with the actual intelligence of its main character. Justine isn’t just the stupid twit running away from the killers. In a delightful and surprising twist of events, Justine finds clever ways to distract her pursuers and eventually ends up throwing her hands up and saying “I am OVER it!” I always like to see victims turn around and say that, even with just one look, if you’ve seen enough horror films…you know what’s coming.
Justine fights back, and while I’d have preferred that they spend more time on this aspect of the film, they did a decent job of wrapping things up neatly. While the ending was anti-climactic, it was overall a good film. I feel like they took the movie in the right direction…but about thirty minutes too late. Had they spent less time on cheap jump scares and close ups of the killers’ creepy foil masks, they could have had the opportunity to add more creative and eventful death scenes with more action than just watching Justine run from building to building. I also think a bad ass fight scene at the end would have been extremely satisfying. But that’s just me.
For a film that wants to be a slasher and plays out like a home invasion, Kristy was not a disappointment. Justine was a great main character and Bennet did the role justice. I’d definitely recommend the film to anyone looking for a new film to watch that’s for the most part still pretty unknown.
Stevie Kopas, HMS
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