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The Least Dangerous Game

There are few horror movies in recent years that ended on a more exhilarating note than Ready or Not, a relatively cheap film combining violent tension and humour and just generally punching way above its weight. That image of Samara Weaving, drenched in blood after the Satanic family she almost married into exploded in validation of their cultish beliefs, sitting on the steps of their mansion coldly smoking a cigarette has to be one of the great moments of modern horror. The punch-line she delivers to arriving officers is a perfect punctuation as well.
But because Ready or Not was such an unexpected hit, eventually we arrive at the obligatory sequel, odiously titled Ready or Not 2: Here I Come. Seven years later, it brings back the original directors Matt Bettinelli-Olpin and Tyler Gillett -who in the interim revived the Scream franchise for two movies and made a good vampire film equivalent of Ready or Not called Abigail. Additionally Fox Searchlight more than doubled the budget and buffed up the cast, which now boasts several well-known names, including Weaving this time around. It is by all measure a much bigger movie, though of course -and especially in horror- bigger is not often the same as better.
This movie picks up directly after the previous one, and indeed by its end it’ll be remarked that both movies take place over the course of a single weekend. Weaving’s Grace is taken to the hospital and interrogated as a suspect in the deaths of the entire Le Domas family, before her estranged little sister Faith (Kathryn Newton) turns up. But it is revealed that the Le Domases were part of an elite council of six wealthy Satanist families, who are now bound to re-enact the same game of Hide & Seek with Grace for the all-powerful High Seat of the council. Grace and Faith are found and kidnapped, once again forced to partake in the game of survival till dawn on a secluded estate where they are hunted by rich psychopaths.
In expanding the world of the first film, it seems pretty clear that Bettinelli-Olpin and Gillett turned to the John Wick series as an influence. The High Table to High Seat equivalent is obvious but so too is the broadening of one cultish family into a cabal of global proportions -three of these new families being based out of China, India, and Latin-America- and with a highly ordered structure epitomized in the chaotically neutral Lawyer for the Devil (called “Le Bail”) played by Elijah Wood, who oversees the game and enforces rigorously its rules against both Grace and Faith and the families alike. But it feels more haphazard than something like John Wick, having to stretch to not only rationalize a repeat game of Hide & Seek but also to establish this larger order, that is frankly just much less interesting and creepy than the set-up that was presented in that first movie. And there is also the fact that the reveal at the end of that film, legitimizing this devil preemptively ruins the stakes for this movie and takes the bite out of much of the malice these combined families can now inflict.
However the biggest misfire might be the inclusion of Faith. The idea to include somebody else in in this conundrum with Grace makes sense as far as just adding a new component, and casting a rising star like Newton for broader appeal is understandable if very cynical. But the secret sister plot element is pretty badly contrived and the script does little to hide that. Their estrangement is an important point then, yet it is through most of the film expressed -even under the duress of the game- in cheap and empty conflict and ham-fisted attempts at emotional resonance. There's not a lot of chemistry between Weaving and Newton, the latter of whom distinctly comes off as a cheap gimmick and marketing ploy (it is perhaps Newton's least-interesting character so far as well, and that is including in Ant-Man), but neither is helped by the feeble dialogue trying to cast their relationship in a serious light. So much of the film's personal stakes are invested in this unconvincing dynamic that is beset by a series of plot clichés -including a split up that could be easily avoided- and it has an adverse effect even on Grace's character, who is far less engaging a protagonist than in the first film.
The directors perhaps concede this by emphasizing so much the elaborate (and genre culture conscious) cast of villains, who not only hunt the girls but commentate on the situation from their mansion compound. A great degree of comic relief is given over to Varun Saranga and Dan Beirne, each a little down the line of succession responsibility in their respective families, Néstor Carbonell is a charismatic highlight, his former Lost co-star Kevin Durand has a brief but deranged early role, and David Cronenberg gets to cameo as the Danforth family patriarch. His scions are a brother and sister played by Shawn Hatosy and Sarah Michelle Gellar, the two most prominent of the cabal and a not so subtle parallel to Grace and Faith (while likewise echoing Cruel Intentions in their dynamic, status and Gellar's casting). There is some fun personality to each of these figures, though nowhere to the level of their predecessors in the last film.
Indeed, it is the last film's novelty that spoils much of the effect for this one. The casual psychopathy of the characters, their special weapons, and of course their violent deaths don't have the same impact they did before. Certainly, the bloodbath of spontaneous combustion feels rote now that it is no longer a twist. We see it again early, and the disinterested reaction of the Lawyer mirrors our own. It actually diminishes the suspense of an already much less intense film that is already playing the exact same game with little variance and in broad daylight where the action just doesn't feel so dangerous. It leans harder into the comedy than the horror, but isn't sharp or distinct enough in its humour to pierce through on that. Its endeavours to replicate the former tone fall short -sticking Grace in the exact same wedding dress and putting the movie in such close proximity to the first feel just a touch desperate. And it is all under a context that is so steeped in the Satanic cabal aspect -especially by the climax which brings forth silly robes and underground temples and the like, that it loses whatever grounding that first movie had.
Ready or Not 2 does have its moments of fun and ingenuity -murder via washing machine comes to mind, and some of the actors make the most of their material (though Cronenberg ought to have been allowed more). But quite frankly, the card has been played and it's not nearly so thrilling the second time. Bettinelli-Olpin and Gillett expanded their world but didn't expand their premise and stakes in an equivalent way, and the ballooned budget does not appear represented on screen where the movie looks distinctly pale and drab compared to the first. It is perhaps a new poster child for the ills of horror movies selling out and going mainstream, mutating into franchises whether they are ready or not.

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