This movie starts with a pretty basic setup. A teen girl is riding in a car with her mom. A car accident happens and the mom dies. I will say this car accident scene was very well done. It felt sudden and unexpected. The way the car rolled felt realistic. And as the car rolled I found myself holding my breath. Realizing what the result was gonna be when it stopped rolling. And then a tire bounced down the road and off screen. A great little detail to make the scene feel more real. And then as everything settles and the camera pulls back showing the tragic scene, a quiet moment stretches. Two moments. Three. And then the traffic light changes to red, reflecting on the road. A great ending to the scene. It sounds crazy, but I really want to watch this movie again, but as I’m writing this I am less than halfway through!
Max is the teen who survives the accident, but her mom Amanda does not. Her mom was an actress who got stereotyped into her career because she had a role in a popular “Friday the 13th” style movie called “Camp Bloodbath.” Jumping a little we have Max and a small group of her peers who go to a special screening of Camp Bloodbath where a very Final Destination sequence of events results in the screening turning into a tragic fire. In the movie (the one within the movie), the killer is a very Jason type named Billy. The movie is pretty much a stereotype of 80’s horror. The story is very basic and the characters in it are very 2 dimensional. A fascinating aspect to it is how the characters in the actual movie are well done and interesting but have to interact with the poorly written ones from Camp Bloodbath. At one point a character interacts playfully with them commenting on how badly written they are. The Meta of this plays out in a very fun way. Even the moment where the characters first realize they are in the movie was funny as they watched the van pull up as it was heading to camp. And then 92 minutes later it pulled up again. And then 92 minutes later they decide to interact with the movie and hop a ride to the camp with them.
Eventually though Camp Bloodbath starts taking its toll on the kids who have gone into the movie. They have changed the plot. Their presence made things different and Billy simply incorporated the new bodies into his now higher body count.
Something I didn’t expect when I started watching this was that it was going to be a story with emotional gravity and weight to it. Max gets a chance to interact with her mom again. Gets a chance to try and save her mom in the movie even though she was supposed to die. Max and her mom reconnect in a story that was so much more than the horror comedy it was billed as.
Max is played by Taissa Farmiga. A last name that I instantly recognized as her sister Vera played the Norma in Bates Motel
This movie resonated with me. Final Girls is literally something I am going to Amazon and putting in my shopping cart after I post this review. I’m torn between 10 stars and a Gold star. I’m going to err on the side of giving it a Gold star because the DVD says there is a writer commentary track, a cast and crew commentary track, deleted scenes with commentary, and an alternate ending! The special features listed for this absolutely jump this up to a Gold star. I love me a commentary track and this comes with 2 and a half!