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The first reviews for new horror movie Bodies Bodies Bodies are in – but what do the critics think? Directed by Dutch filmmaker Halina Reijn in her debut English-language feature premiered at this year's SXSW Film Festival and stars Amandla Stenberg, Maria Bakalova, Rachel Sennott, Lee Pace, and Pete Davidson.
The movie, which has been praised for its comedic satire, follows a group of wealthy 20-somethings throwing a party in a remote mansion belonging to one of their families as they shelter from a hurricane. However, the festivities quickly take an ugly turn and things start to go very, very wrong.
We've rounded up what the critics are saying about Bodies Bodies Bodies to give you an idea of what to expect diving into the movie.
Deadline
"Imagine if the seven deadly sins were wealthy Gen-Z’rs and threw a house party. Now at said party, imagine each of them was high, drunk, and in such a deranged and disconnected state they wouldn’t even know what planet they were operating on. This is what viewers can expect from Halina Reijn’s first English feature film, Bodies Bodies Bodies, which had its world premiere at SXSW 2022. Based on a short story by Kristen Roupenian and written by Sarah DeLappe, this movie is about when seven people party in a mansion and find out what happens when their game gets out of control: they stop being polite and start dying."
Variety
"Bodies Bodies Bodies is Halina Reijn’s second feature, but she’s a veteran actor who stages the movie as a freewheeling actors’ banquet. She’s working from a script, by Sarah Delappe, that lays out the relationships like something in a diagram, but the dialogue is blade-sharp. There’s a message buried somewhere in all this – about how today’s twentysomethings are too obsessed with creating demons, often out of thin air, and knocking them down. Yet it’s not as if the movie doesn’t revel in that."
The Hollywood Reporter
"Reijn indulges in several longer takes that give the performers an opportunity to drill into the nuances of their characters and add a bit of edge to the horror scenes. That, coupled with the jittery iPhone lighting (the power goes out immediately), makes parts of Bodies Bodies Bodies believably frightening. These details also bolster the film when its screenplay proves a bit shaky."
Bloody Disgusting
"The cast is more than up to the task of this bizarre and engaging but deadly social experiment. All play deeply flawed characters with varying degrees of rooting interest. But it’s Sennott’s abrasively blunt Alice that steals the entire film. Alice, more than any other, tries to keep the peace. She’s also the character most susceptible to groupthink. It creates a dizzying, contradictory blend that Sennott chews up and spits out with reckless abandon, much to the amusement and delight of the audience."
IndieWire
"It all comes together, primarily, because Reijin crafts a convincing mirror against super-online audiences. Her direction imbues this film with a striking originality, wherein the unrelenting tension and paranoid mood combine toward unnerving ends. The lighting, planned in collaboration with cinematographer Jasper Wolf (Monos) and the actors themselves, rely on sparse lights from cellphones and flashlights, as they explore the immense mansion for the killer. The chiaroscuro shades create a gripping claustrophobic effect, as the actors fumble around in the dark. Winding stairs become a dark death trap, rendered creepier by the whimsical score. A car at the center of a hurricane’s whipping winds becomes a brief haven. I also just love the idea that without wifi, we’d all descend into murder."
Bodies Bodies Bodies doesn't have a release date yet. While we wait for it to arrive on our screens, check out our list of the best horror movies of all time.
