Photo courtesy of DatBot via Wikimedia Commons.
By Sarah Berger ’27 and Nyx Cieprisz ’26
Staff Writer | A&E Section Editor
Warning: this story contains spoilers.
Although many 2023 film releases generated intense discussion, none seemed to cause quite as much confusion as Eli Roth’s slasher film “Thanksgiving,” which became available on Netflix earlier this month.
Based on the title and genre alone, you would be forgiven for expecting a legitimate critique of the genocide-based holiday, à la Jordan Peele. Or perhaps the film could be a modern addition to the slasher canon that includes “Halloween” (1978), “Friday the Thirteenth” (1980) or even the satirical take of “Scream” (1996). You may even be expecting something along the lines of Roth’s spectacularly gory movies “Hostel” (2005), the tale of a pay-for-torture enterprise, or “The Green Inferno” (2013), an homage to “Cannibal Holocaust.”
Unfortunately, “Thanksgiving” is all of these things and none of them at the same time; styled as a holiday-themed slasher, it focuses on a killer seeking revenge against the residents of Plymouth, Massachusetts, after a Black Friday stampede the previous year leaves several people dead. If that doesn’t seem Thanksgiving-themed enough, the killer dresses as John Carver, the first governor of the Plymouth colony.
The movie begins just before the stampede. We meet Jessica (Addison Rae), her family and her friends. When Jessica’s father refuses to close his store on Thanksgiving as a last-ditch attempt to capitalize off of shoppers, she and her friends sneak inside the store and taunt the Black Friday crowds. After the ensuing Black Friday stampede, Jessica shows no shame about her family’s actions or remorse for the part she played in the massacre.
When she receives threats from the killer, her only reaction is vague annoyance. Her friends are worse, live-streaming the bloodshed and speaking in a TikTok-esque frat-bro dialect that makes it impossible to empathize with or distinguish between them. It seems as though they only exist so that there are people to be killed.
“Thanksgiving” also displays a surprising lack of consideration for how the slasher formula may need to evolve into the 2020s. Viewers have become accustomed to more inventive murder methods and plots, so a masked killer picking off high schoolers with an ax doesn’t cut it. When a gun emerges in the final act, it feels disjointed and sloppy. If you want us to believe an ax is scary, don’t show something that dwarfs it.
In a poor attempt to modernize, “Thanksgiving” includes some references to technology. There is one memorable scene where a character, hiding from the killer, is unable to call for help because her phone’s face ID cannot recognize her mutilated face. Although the premise has potential, the execution is laughable. It also ignores the emergency call feature, which is incredibly ubiquitous.
The killer also frequently posts on social media, which only makes it more confusing that he eludes police for so long — their excuse is that his phone is powered off, so there’s no way he could be tracked. He’s not moving particularly fast, nor does he seem to have much of a master plan, so his days-long reign of terror comes off as somewhat unrealistic.
There are many legitimate critiques of Thanksgiving, the holiday, from the vapid consumerism that follows it to the genocide it was created on. Unfortunately, “Thanksgiving” seems more interested in turkey and parade motifs than an actual examination of the holiday. When watching someone shave her own leg off in “Cabin Fever” or the prolonged drill torture scene in “Hostel,” at least the viewer was feeling something — even if it was abject disgust.
“Thanksgiving” isn’t good enough to produce any sort of reaction. Without any kind of message, structure or emotion, the movie’s only merit is its absurdity. It’s not scary, funny or interesting. At less than two hours, it manages to feel too long. The ultimate twist isn’t too predictable, but that’s only because it’s hard to imagine caring enough to predict it. In terms of horror comedy, you can do a lot better than “Thanksgiving.”