Review of You're Next (2013) by Spencer S — 31 Dec 2014

Ineffectual, contrived, and badly staged and acted, "You're Next" is another in a long list of boring home invasion films that have emerged in recent years. The first twenty minutes of the film tries to set up the characters, but does a terrible job of it, and half the cast's characteristics are undermined by the horror genre setup.

Many of the characters are just bodies to be murdered by the masked killers, the only gimmick the film really has. The acting in this is also horrible, especially by AJ Bowen who looks like he's in a student film.

Sharni Vinson is the only one who looks like she's actually trying, and she's the only character who does anything throughout the film. Everyone else stands around mindlessly, complaining, when they should be trying to out maneuver the killers.

The plot is also haphazard, as the background information is slight, and the motivation is clichéd. Most of the deaths aren't all that creative (including two identical deaths in a row) and the gore is needlessly unrealistic.

There's also really strange glimpses of nudity, for no other reason than most horror films feature it. I found this to be a slightly frustrating, uneven, logic hating kind of film, that's not worth your time.