Director David F. Sandberg is back in his comfort zone: a remote cabin in the woods filled with terrifying monsters. After helming two “Shazam!” movies, the “Lights Out” filmmaker announced he was leaving superheroes behind and going back to the horror genre, and with his latest film, “Until Dawn,” it’s obvious he’s happy to be home.
Like any good horror buff, Sandberg knows that the best examples need only a few well-honed elements to work: a group of young people, the aforementioned scary cabin and, in this case, clowns. The script by Blair Butler and Gary Dauberman is based on a PlayStation game written by filmmakers Larry Fessenden and Graham Reznick, who took inspiration from movies like “Evil Dead” and “Poltergeist.” The film adaptation indeed boasts that “Evil Dead” influence in its setting, characters and gore factor.
But “Until Dawn” is also influenced by postmodern, self-referential stuff like “The Cabin in the Woods” and “Happy Death Day” that play with form and expectations. It melds horror tropes with the rules of video game play (repetition, multiple lives), resulting in a film that’s part genre tribute, part choose your own adventure, part interactive haunted house.
A group of comely young adults arrive at a strange “Welcome Center” while on a weekend trip searching for Melanie (Maia Mitchell), the sister of Clover (Ella Rubin), who has been missing for a year. Clover’s friends Max (Michael Cimino), Megan (Ji-young Yoo) and Nina (Odessa A’zion) have come along for moral support, along with Abe (Belmont Cameli), Nina’s new boyfriend. The ominously spooky vibes are off the charts and things go very badly, very quickly for the friends. But then, an hourglass turns and time winds back. The friends are alive, stunned and battered — and they remember everything that happened. What horrific thing might kill them in the next time loop?
“Survive the night or become a part of it,” a crone whispers to Clover during her second loop, and therein lies the key to their survival. If they can manage to avoid getting killed until the sunrise, they’ll be fine (relatively). It’s just that every loop brings new nightmares, unknown dangers and different predators, never allowing the group to get ahead of things. They have to die and die again, searching for a way out of this temporal maze. But how many chances do they have?
Sandberg, Dauberman and Butler work in a familiar kind of schlocky groove, delivering well-worn horror stereotypes we’ve already seen too many times, before upending the whole thing with wild surprises. We’ve seen these players and the board before, but the filmmakers try to keep us on our toes with how the whole thing plays out.
However, if you’re expecting any of this to make sense in a real way, don’t bother. Peter Stormare orbits around the edges as a creepy gas station attendant and/or trauma psychologist, who at one time did research on this town where a devastating mine collapse destroyed most of the population. He’s doing a study on the transformative effects of fear, but that doesn’t explain why the zombie miners wear clown masks, nor does it shed light on a number of supernatural idiosyncrasies. But “Until Dawn” doesn’t have to make sense to work. The movie’s universe has its own specific set of ironclad rules and that’s all that matters.
The loop structure gives us more time with these characters too. Though they all slot into known archetypes — the steely yet vulnerable “final girl,” the condescending jock, the sarcastic pal, the kooky yet intuitive bestie — they’re all fully formed characters, sardonic and self-aware. There’s infighting and conflict as the nights wear on, and somehow everyone is right in their own way, but they remain united, unlike most groups of friends who find themselves in a forest filled with murderous entities.
Sandberg isn’t trying to elevate “Until Dawn” above its B-movie horror roots and he embraces the good, the bad and the gory with his return, referencing beloved films that set the pace and established the iconography for something like this (he even nods to his own work in a couple of playful tributes). This one will likely appeal only to fans who appreciate reverence and twists alike, but it’s bloody if lightweight fun for those who enjoy this kind of good old-fashioned romp in the woods.
Walsh is a Tribune News Service film critic.
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