Send Help Review: My best theater experience since No Way Home

Spoilers ahead for Send Help!

I will admit I didn't enjoy the trailer for this film at all. It didn't really sell me on this film being all that great, and I was mostly just going off my borrowed trust for Sam Raimi. And thank heavens I had that trust, because this is one of the most entertaining yet frightening films I've ever watched in theaters, and one of my new favorite theater experiences. So, I, Brighton Nelson, am going to tell you why that is in today's Reel Ranker review.

Usually, I start off with the bad and then move into the good so I can get my negatives out of the way before I get into the positives... but I honestly think this movie is perfect. I have no notes. I mean, if I had to come up with something for the heck of it, maybe I'd have liked a more downer ending where Linda got what was coming to her, but I've got no other thoughts. So, now it's time for all this film's brilliant positives.

To get the obvious out of the way, Rachel McAdams and Dylan O'Brien have got to do more roles like this. This movie displayed that they're both absolutely brilliant at acting in horror and comedy, and I hope that at least one of them gets nominated for an Oscar because those performances were impeccable. Their characters and how they were written were also a huge part of why this movie was so phenomenal. The shifts in the dynamic between the two and which of them we were rooting for really made the film for me, and Linda and Bradley were easily two of the most well-written characters of the past decade. They had a ton of personality and were simultaneously so likable and despicable throughout the film's runtime. Bradley somehow becomes likable by the end, and Linda somehow descends so far into madness that it's unhinged in the best way possible, yet neither compromises their characters or seems out of left field. The character work here is just that excellent.

Send Help imbues the best of Sam Raimi into every frame of the movie. With a masterful mix of character-focused psychological horror, gory survival horror, and laugh-out-loud (often gross-out) comedy that is sure to bring the whole theater to the brink of hilarity, this film manages to fire on all cylinders throughout every second of its runtime.

The humor and horror here are equally fantastic, as always in Raimi's best films. While I'd say it's overall more of a dark comedy thriller than a horror film, the pretend castration scene here is one of the most horrifying I've ever seen. That sound design, the eye acting of Dylan O'Brien... that was insane. Of course, we also get some great horror sequences with the death of Bradley's girlfriend and her turning into a zombie in dreamworld, and the home-invasion sequence at the end. The gore here is used almost exclusively for laughs... that boar scene is ridiculous in the best way.

Also, the plot twists and turns here were incredible, and I didn't see them coming at all. While I was a little skeptical of the fancy fish Linda was getting, I honestly just thought that was part of the zany comedy. But when the plot twists started to come, it all made sense and was very satisfying.

The best thing about Send Help is that it blends all its elements into one of the most rollercoaster-ride films I've ever watched. There's probably nothing that makes me love a film more than going through every emotion on the spectrum, and this film constantly shifts from hilarious to horrifying scene to scene. I love all the little parts of survival that we get to see. As someone who loves the show Alone, framing that experience in a Sam Raimi way was hilarious.

The Reel Ranker Verdict

Reel or Unreel? - Reel
The Reel Ranker Score: 98%
Letter Score: S+
Star Ranking: 5 out of 5

Send Help imbues the best of Sam Raimi into every frame of the movie. With a masterful mix of character-focused psychological horror, gory survival horror, and laugh-out-loud (often gross-out) comedy that is sure to bring the whole theater to the brink of hilarity, this film manages to fire on all cylinders throughout every second of its runtime. Go see this movie in theaters—you'll thank me later.

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