I’m back with another quick, bite-sized horror movie review for the Halloween season. We started off this series with a classic in City of the Dead and now we’re moving on the something quite a bit newer.
Today’s movie is 2020’s Initiation.
Pledge week is moving along quite normally at Whiton University until a sorority member is found unconscious in a room with a couple frat boys. After some cruel name calling on social media, one of the star athletes of the school is found impaled to death. Students soon begin dropping like flies as the main core of characters try to survive a slasher with an unknown motive.
Even though that description might invoke memories of films like Black Christmas (1974), or the Black Christmas (2006) remake, or the other Black Christmas (2019) remake that’s not really a remake, Initiation is actually nothing like those movies. It lets things happen at its own, measured pace.
It takes about 30 minutes for the film to really get going and then the film lets each kill breathe a bit before heading into the last frenzied 20 minutes. I can see how some people will think the movie drags a bit but the movie does its best to set up the pieces for the film’s finale.
With a limited number of charactes introduced throughout the movie, it doesn’t take much to figure out who the killer ultimately is but the movie does add a nice little twist to it.
Initiation also does the best job of incorporating technology on-screen to further a story that I’ve ever seen. Text messages are passed throughout between characters and you can see what they’re scrolling through or reading. It’s a bit jarring at the beginning but it gets woven into the story in really interesting ways.
Initiation is not going to be talked about 20 years from now but there are far worse ways to spend an evening.
It’s currently available to rent on Youtube, Google Play, and other streaming platforms for $5.99.
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