On Friday, Oct. 13, “Happy Death Day” came to theaters, adding to the list of scary movies to go see this Halloween season. Produced by Blumhouse, makers of, “Get out,” “Split,” and “The Purge,” and directed by Christopher Landon, this terrifying horror version of “Groundhog Day” introduces a good blend of humor mixed in with the scary that goes beyond its release date. The movie begins with college girl Tree (Jessica Rothe) waking up on her birthday- only to be murdered by a person in a creepy baby mask later that night. Every time she’s killed, she wakes up in the morning on the same day and has to live through it all again. Unsure of why she keeps waking up on the same day, but confident that the loop will break if she can identify the killer and prevent herself from being killed, Tree must live through a series of horrible deaths every day until she is able to solve the case of her own murder.
This proves difficult, because, as Tree soon finds out, there’s not a limited amount of suspects. From her roommate in her Sorority house to the wife of the Professor Tree is secretly dating, Tree has made many enemies. And, after discovering that she gets a little weaker every time she gets killed, she may only have a limited time to figure it out.
The film does a great job of unifying each day with the same events, but at the same time changing certain things to keep it interesting. Each night offers new locations for where Tree is killed and new ways for her to die, which prevents the movie from becoming too redundant. This is hard to do, considering the movie is the reliving of the same day over and over.
The film also does a great job of character development and morality. The movie allows Tree to change from a mean brat to a nice person that actually cares about others. The time she spends reliving the same day ends up being a blessing in disguise, because it teaches her an incredible life lesson that allows her to fix the mistakes in her life, if only she can live to see tomorrow.
Overall, “Happy Death Day” is a great movie and doesn’t fall short of its scary expectations that can just as easily make one laugh. The film does an effective job of entertaining the audience with all the great elements of a scary movie, and not without a couple of unforeseen plot twists.
Nicholas Sowell // Co-Sports Editor
