Eli Roth’s Thanksgiving (2023) is trending on Netflix Top 10. It’s a slasher who-dunnit mystery. A satirical attack on materialism and consumerism presented as a modern urban horror tale. The Black Friday sale turns into a bloody gore fest when the crowd at Right-Mart becomes uncontrollable leading to a stampede and a massacre of those present. From the beheading, the chainsaw to the killer covering the victim’s body with syrup and garnishing it on the kitchen table, it has it all.
The movie is based on a trailer Roth made for Quentin Tarantino and Robert Rodriguez’s movie ‘Grindhouse.’ If you are familiar with Roth’s earlier work, you know that it’s much less gory and bloody than the Hostel trilogy films. Surprisingly, it’s much more creative in its butchery and bloodshed.
Patrick Dempsey plays the role of the sheriff of the town. The film is set in Plymouth, Massachusetts. It’s Thanksgiving and a mob is gathered outside Right Mart, a superstore. The store owner’s daughter lets her friends early before the sale and it enrages the mob. They storm in shattering the glass door and the stampede results in the deaths of a few those present on the scene.
One year later, a rogue killer starts murdering everyone who was involved in that bloody riot that day. He is wearing a John Carver (pun intended?) mask and is butchering anyone who he holds responsible for the stampede starting from the waitress who he cuts in half and displays at the top of the Right Mart to make a spectacle of it.
If you don’t know who John Carver is, he was one of the pilgrims who made the Mayflower voyage in 1620 and an early settler of the Plymouth colony. So a pretty important figure for Thanksgiving. His mask bears resemblance to the Guy Fawkes mask in V for Vendetta.
This killer is out for blood. He murders and beheads the coward of a security guard who was supposed to manage the crowd at the store. Instead, he flew from the scene, unable to control the raging crowd. But wait. Does the killer have a soft side? He only murders the man and not his cat. He is working with a purpose. There is a motive to his ruthless and bloody rage. He is not one of those irrational psycho killers who kills anything that moves. It adds depth to his character (sounds ironic? I know).
He tags Jessica (the owner’s daughter) and her friends on Instagram posts displaying the bodies of his victims around the dinner table as he holds them responsible for the carnage and is letting them know that he will be coming for them. The whole riot was livestreamed by Jessica’s friend Evan, thus trivializing such a fateful moment as if other people’s lives can be used for becoming famous and other people’s misery is up for show. The killer, in turn uses it to tease and mock the torture of his captives. He livestreams his session with them.
I love those kinds of movies that keep you guessing till the end and this is definitely one of those movies. The reveal is shocking yet detectable during the last half of the movie. The point of suspicion keeps moving from one person to another. After the end reveal, when you watch it all over again, it makes a lot more sense. The turkey with no head joke and why the sheriff fired his gun in the air during the stampede.
Halfway through the movie, I started complaining that Patrick Dempsey doesn’t have much screentime. At least, now I know there is a reason for that. The rest of the cast features Nell Verlaque, Addison Rae, Jalen Thomas Brooks, Gina Gershon and others.
I don’t usually like slashy or horror movies but this one exceeded expectations. It did fastrack towards the end but it’s a fun watch and definitely deserves to be added to your list of Thanksgiving movies.
Let me know what you think about this movie in the comment section below.
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