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Genre: Horror
Premise: (from IMDB) A bride’s wedding night takes a sinister turn when her eccentric new in-laws force her to take part in a terrifying game.
About: Today’s writing team has been together since 8th grade! 20+ years later, they’ve finally gotten their first wide-release film made. Ready or Not has been getting some nice buzz leading up to its release, nabbing an 87% Rotten Tomatoes score. But it ran into a Gerard Butler buzzsaw this weekend, and came away with a disappointing 7.5 million.
Writer: Guy Busick & Ryan Murphy
Details: 95 minutes
So let me tell you why I chose Ready or Not for the coveted Monday review slot. It’s quite simple, really. This is the kind of script you should be writing if you want to a) sell a script, b) get a movie made, or c) both. It’s a simple concept that’s easy to understand. It’s relatively inexpensive. And it’s highly marketable.
And let’s not forget that these scripts are effortless reads. Never underestimate the power of the easy read. That’s not to say stories set during the Revolutionary War with 30 characters can’t be riveting. But, typically, complex scripts that make noise in town come from already known writers with an established network of producers and executives who are aware of their work. As a “nobody” who’s given a much shorter rope, it’s in your best interest to keep things easy to follow.
In fact, this weekend’s box office is a major win for spec script writing. The number one movie, Angel Has Fallen, is the second sequel from a spec script. Good Boys is a spec script anyone could’ve written. Hobbs & Shaw stemmed from a franchise that started with a spec script. And then you’ve got Ready or Not. Lessons? Specs with a clear marketable genre (horror or action) get made. And comedy still sells if you can find a slightly different angle (kids in adult R-rated situations).
Ready or Not follows Grace, a regular girl who marries a really good guy named Alex Le Domas. Alex belongs to a billionaire family who’s made their fortune on board games. Which is why they have a little ritual for anyone who marries into the family. Each new member has to play a game.
A little box device randomly decides the game. But there’s a twist. Normally, the games are harmless fun. But there’s one game on the menu that carries with it a little more weight – Hide and Seek. Should this game be chosen, it will be up to the family to find and kill the bride. If she stays hidden until dawn, she wins. And if that happens, the rumor is the entire family dies.
Grace hasn’t been told this, of course. Alex is hoping that it won’t come to Hide and Seek. The last time it popped up was over 30 years ago. But it does come up. And Grace learns quickly that this is not some fun little game. But there is some good news for the bride. Everybody chasing her is a moron. From her coked up sister-in law to her chubby brother-in-law, who’s so clueless about the ordeal, he has to Youtube how to use his crossbow. And let’s not forget Aunt Helene, who’s more bloodthirsty than a swarm of mosquitos yet who’s only slightly taller than one. Will Grace succumb to this ship of fools or will they somehow pull it together and win the game?
For a horror film to work, it’s imperative that the audience feel fear for the hero. If they don’t feel like the hero is in danger, they’re not going to be invested in the story. I remember watching The Exorcist, arguably the scariest movie of all time, and thinking, “There’s nothing they can do for this girl.” That’s what propelled me to keep watching. I wanted, against all odds, to see if they could save her.
Ready or Not installs a different approach to its story. The characters chasing our heroine are bumbling morons. Most of them haven’t done this before. And they seem more interested in squabbling with each other than killing the bride. This immediately sets a less fearful tone. If no one is good at this, why would I be scared for the bride? Indeed, this made me feel safe during many of the film’s set pieces. When the bride was hiding behind a kitchen island to avoid a guy, I felt confident she would get out of it.
Contrast this with one of my favorite movies of 2017, Revenge, about a group of hunters in the desert who are “forced” by circumstance to hunt down a woman. While I wouldn’t call any of these men expert hunters, they were a lot more capable than the characters in Ready or Not. I remember feeling a level of fear in that movie that I never came close to here.
There’s an argument to be made, however, that this wasn’t Ready or Not’s intention. That it was more interested in making the audience laugh than scream. Many 80s horror movies built entire franchises on this setup. Jason from Friday the 13th has lots of funny kills. And he still remained scary. So why didn’t I feel that way here? Why didn’t I go along with all the goofiness and just have fun?
It’s really hard for me to forgive incompetent villains in a horror movie. UNLESS you’re talking about a straight horror-comedy, like Tucker and Dale Vs. Evil. I need to be afraid of SOMEONE. I need to fear SOMEBODY. Because that’s the whole gig. Your idea cannot work if we’re not worried for the person in danger. I never once in this movie thought Grace was in danger.
On top of this, the rules governing the story were a little, shall we say, messy. When you come up with one of these ideas, you don’t want to overcomplicate things. It has to feel effortless. It may not have been effortless for YOU, the writer, but it should seem effortless to the audience. That’s one of the primary jobs of the writer. This whole thing where a game is randomly chosen every time someone enters the family… but only ONE OF THE GAMES is a deadly one? Uhhhh… I’m not sure that makes sense other than in the bowels of movie logic land. The games need to be either deadly or not deadly. They can’t be sometimes deadly.
Fixing this would’ve also fixed the “fear” problem. If the family did this every year, they would’ve been a lot more capable. Which would’ve made Grace’s situation a lot more difficult. But I know the screenwriting reasons they didn’t do it. For starters, there would be too many deaths tied to the family if they’re playing these games all the time. Also, they needed a plausible scenario by which a good man, Alex, would bring Grace into the family. He’s not going to bring her in if he knows for a fact she’ll be hunted. Unless you wanted to make Alex a sick psychopath, which I personally would’ve liked better (what’s more horrifying than the person you trust most hunting you – that’s why Revenge was so harrowing!).
These are the things that can drive screenwriters crazy – working through problems like this. But my approach is to always err on the side of logic. Once you start coming up with convoluted rules to create more convenient writing scenarios for yourself, you risk destroying the suspension of disbelief. I say this is a much better movie if they do the deadly game every time. It certainly makes more sense than, “We play a game every time someone comes into the family except sometimes it’s a deadly game cause, um, if not there wouldn’t be a movie.”
Are these the reasons Ready or Not couldn’t crack 8 million? No. People won’t feel the effects of these choices unless they see the movie. The low box office is all about the film being stuck in the “real world” horror genre. Horror movies that get into the 20 Million Dollar and Up club have a man in a mask, a monster, or a ghost. There is the rarity that slips through, like Get Out. But I don’t see it as a coincidence that “It” had the biggest horror opening of all time. And it also has one of the scariest monsters of all time. I give you this information because if you’re thinking of writing a horror film, you can boost the project’s box office potential just by adding one of those elements.
Ready or Not was not a bad movie. But it definitely wasn’t worth a trip to the theater. This is the kind of movie that works with zero expectations on Netflix and a large half-meatball pizza from Larchmont Village Pizzeria sitting in front of you. If you spent $15 on this, you’re probably leaving the film upset.
[ ] What the hell did I just watch?
[x] wasn’t for me
[ ] worth the price of admission
[ ] impressive
[ ] genius
What I learned: Here are the top 2 box office grossing horror films from 2019 all the way back to 2010. Us and Annabelle Comes Home, A Quiet Place and Halloween, It and Get Out, The Conjuring 2 and Don’t Breathe, Goosebumps and Insidious 3, Annabelle and Ouija, The Conjuring and Insidious 2, Paranormal Activity 4 and The Devil Inside, Paranormal Activity 3 and Insidious. — Of these, only two were “real-world” horror. Don’t Breathe and Get Out (I’m not sure what you would categorize US as). This is why you want that monster, ghost, or mask. With that said, socially-conscious horror-thrillers (like Get Out) might be able to slip into the top 2 in the next few years.
