Hell Fest
“While overly simplistic, Hell Fest does feature some nuances of female friendship.”
Title: Hell Fest (2018)
Director: Gregory Plotkin 👨🏼🇺🇸
Writers: Akela Cooper 👩🏾🇺🇸, Blair Butler 👩🏼🇺🇸, and Seth Sherwood 👨🏼🇺🇸
Reviewed by Keturah Kendrick 👩🏾🇺🇸
Note: This review was commissioned by Lionsgate. The content and methodology remain 100% independent and in line with Mediaversity's non-commissioned reviews.
—SPOILERS AHEAD—
Technical: 2.75/5
If you’re a fan of scary movies, Hell Fest will feel familiar. It has all the ingredients one comes to expect in the genre, set on Halloween night as a group of twenty-somethings head to a haunted house. But in this case they visit an amusement park, so even better, right? And they’ve paid extra to go to the super scary part of the park that blurs reality. For example: Did that lady really get stabbed? Like actually shanked in the gut by that masked man who’d been following them around all night? Or was that the extra experience they paid for? The suspense builds into enough close calls that by the time the first body officially hits the floor, you’ll need an extra glass of wine to calm your nerves.
As effective as this vibe is, however, the film fails to flesh out its characters enough for us to care about them. Protagonist Natalie (Amy Forsyth) leads the group of friends as the “voice of reason” who senses something is off from the start. In Taylor (Bex Taylor-Klaus), we have the free-spirited adventurer. And then there’s Brooke (Reign Edwards) whose main purpose is to be the reason Natalie’s back in town from college, so that the friends can hang for a weekend. The three male leads are also used as devices, there to paint Natalie as the smart one no one listens to.
In the end, I can appreciate Hell Fest for what it is: a scary movie that checks the boxes. But it will hardly wow viewers, especially any connoisseurs of the genre.
Gender: 3.5/5
Does it pass the Bechdel Test? YES
Studies show that having more women behind the camera translates into more women onscreen. In the case of Hell Fest, Akela Cooper and Blair Butler’s roles as screenwriters may have helped cast three women as leading protagonists.
It may also explain why the narrative, while overly simplistic, does feature some nuances of female friendship. Brooke and Natalie talk about how much they miss living in the same town and vow to reconnect by taking a trip to Spain. And while Taylor and Natalie are polar opposites, more frenemies than friends, Natalie is appropriately concerned when it looks like Taylor might be the next to disappear. In contrast, Gavin (Roby Attal) seems to exist just to provide fodder for banter about whether Natalie will finally hook up with him, while the other two men feel even more inconsequential. Despite these unnecessary love interests, Hell Fest get points for being a horror movie that doesn’t rely on the trope of pretty young girls clinging to their boyfriends in haunted houses. After all, the movie has three female leads, two of whom end up saving the day.
But let’s talk about how one of the girls is portrayed. Clearly meant to be the “cool chick” who plays by her own rules, Taylor sports an edgy, gravity-defying hairstyle, cracks lewd jokes, and makes out in public with her boyfriend. These overused depictions beg for a more creative way to convey an unconventional woman.
Race: 2.5/5
Cooper is a Black woman who previously produced and wrote for Marvel’s Luke Cage, a Netflix series set in the culturally rich and majority-Black neighborhood of Harlem. Having her as a key creative behind the camera could potentially have contributed to why Brooke was cast with a Black actor and why, contrary to the horror film trope, Brooke doesn’t get bludgeoned within fifteen minutes of the movie. Either way, I want to believe that Cooper found ways of ensuring Black representation and preservation, even in a film that doesn’t center Black culture.
On the other hand, she still feels isolated as the only Black girl in the movie. Her two best friends, Natalie and Taylor, are white and no parts of Brooke’s backstory feel specific to being a Black woman in a predominantly white town. Furthermore, she is conveniently the “right” shade of brown with the “right” soft features. This casting subtly invites viewers to find her more “feminine” than if she were darker skinned and encourages viewers to sympathize with her, to root for her to make it to the end because her lighter skin tone makes her worth saving. This continues a problematic trend of colorism and is increasingly drawing attention and critique. Combined with the fact that the only Black lead does little more than serve as the white protagonist’s friend speaks both to the low bar set—and how far there still is to go.
Asher, one of the friends played by Matt Mercurio, has just enough melanin to save Brooke from being the only brown person in the group. Like her, his only purpose is to strengthen the narratives of white characters, here as Taylor’s boyfriend so that she has someone to make out with. Mercurio himself is Filipino American and while I don’t expect his ethnicity to be an integral part of the role, there's nothing to distinguish his character from the rest of the cast. The dropping in of characters of color who are “just like the white people,” with no real stories of their own is lazy at best, condescending at worst.
Mediaversity Grade: C 2.92/5
Let’s be clear, Hell Fest is peak mediocrity. If you’re a scaredy-cat who jumps at sudden movements, you’ll be frightened enough but it will still be an unsurprising 90 minutes. Midway through, you'll have figured out how the victims will be picked off and it’ll be clear who will make it to the end. You’ll probably be irritated by the tokenization of “the Black girl” and the “ethnically ambiguous brown boy,” but you’ll remember that the Black girl didn’t die! And two women saved themselves! And it’s probably thanks to Cooper and Butler for making that possible. And finally, if you’re anything like me, you’ll be satisfied enough with how you chose to spend your evening. Just another scary movie on just another Friday night.