mosquitodragon’s review published on Letterboxd:
"Drew, if we're not gonna make it, there's something I need to tell you. Okay? You're an awful photographer! I don't think you have what it takes to be a real social media influencer!"
After having just had my mind agreeably blown by the sheer absurd insanity of The Happening, I thought it might be fun to make a double feature (and surely my only chance to ever do this) of horror films in which one's environment tries to kill you. Firstly, nature, in The Happening. And then, in Margaux, a man-made environment. Yes, this is a movie about an evil house - not a haunted house, but a "smart house" where the AI has turned EVIL. Hal got nothing on this bitch.
Hal does, however, appear in a far superior film. In fact, even mentioning Margaux in the same sentence as 2001: A Space Odyssey is insulting to Kubrick and enough to make the more arrogant cinephiles among us come out in hives and sweats - if only the more arrogant cinephiles would ever watch a movie like this, which of course they wouldn't.
I'm babbling. This movie is not good. The quote up top is probably the moment at which the intended satire of zoomer culture is sharpest. Much as I should be up for that, the fact is, this movie is executed in a pretty uninspired fashion. We get a brilliant kill scene in the first five minutes and then nothing anywhere near as good happens for the rest of the movie. There is an intended group dynamic where some characters are horrible and the others are sympathetic, but even the sympathetic characters are pretty unlikeable.
Margaux talks in sassy Gen-Z vac-speak, which is supposed to be cringey, but somehow comes across as too cringey - for the movie as well as for the character. Little of the tech is very believable and its credibility is helped none by the extremely shitty CGI special effects. There are one or two amusing moments, and I kind of liked Richard Harmon's performance (although he is sidelined as the comic relief) but the rest of the cast simply aren't good enough actors to make this work.
What makes it more disappointing is the fact this was directed by Silent Night's Steven C Miller - now that's what I call a goddamn horror movie - mean-spirited and nasty to an insane degree. It's amazing to think the same guy could come up with something so anodyne.