There’s someone inside your house

"I'm thrilled with the Netflix adaptation of There's someone inside your house as well as the entire team that made it happen. It's so clearly the exact type of film that inspired my novel in the first place. I would have bought a ticket to see this on opening night, rented it at the video store, bought it on DVD. The movie is scary and bloody and gorgeous. Dark and sexy and cool. The script is sharp and funny, and it was written with so much respect for the slasher genre. And the cast! The actors are such genuine stars that they all appear to be glowing from somewhere deep within." - Stephanie Perkins

Discovered during the Fantastic Fest festival (Austin, Texas) that we cover with press accreditation and virtually for the second year, the film (There's someone inside your house by Patrick Brice (Creep (204), Creep 2 (2017) and The Overnight (2014)) is definitely one of the best slashers we've seen recently, as the script, the direction and the horrific scenes are so perfectly mastered that they keep us on the edge of our seats until the last minute of the film. Based on the homonymous New York Times best-selling novel by Stephanie Perkins, the screenplay by Henry Gayden (Shazam! (2019) finds all the charm and effectiveness of the original novel. Certainly Killer game (There's someone inside your house) follows scrupulously the rules of the Slashers but does it with such an efficiency and respect of the genre that it becomes one of the best representatives.

Makani Young (Sydney Park) has moved from Hawaii to a quiet Nebraska town to live with her grandmother and finish high school, but as the countdown to graduation begins, her classmates are stalked by a killer who intends to expose their darkest secrets to the entire town, terrorizing the victims by wearing a mask that resembles their own faces. With her own mysterious past, Makani and her friends must discover the identity of the killer before they become victims.

From the very first scene, which easily reminds us of Scream, the stage is set and the violent murders will follow one another at a steady pace. However, the scenario puts as much emphasis on the description of the high school environment of the main characters as on a criticism of the current American system and in particular the preponderant place of social networks. While some slashers rely more on a countless number of murders and on a rather disappointing interpretation, There's Someone Inside Your House gives back, as did previously directors like John Carpenter (Halloween) (1978) and Wes Craven (Saga Scream (1996-2011)) its letters of nobility to a genre that some consider as minor.

In the same way, the care taken to put forward this killer who has a different mask and resembling his victims returns to the vision that this one is there only to punish his victims for their past mistakes. These numerous masks change the game contrary to Michael Myers, Jason Voorrhes and other serial killers who keep the same one from film to film. The fact of putting his victims face to face with their responsibilities and punishing them for their mistakes makes the vengeful mission of this killer even stronger. He seems to be guided by an unwavering will to render justice and not to obey savage and deadly impulses leading him to kill a maximum of people without any real motivation. It is impossible not to see in this killer the reflection of these victims who hide their real personality behind a mask and play skillfully with deceptive appearances.

The killings in the film are all as original as they are neat and violent. One suspects that if the film had been released directly in theaters and not on Netflix, the violence would have been sanitized as much as possible as it was the case in the poor horrific saga I know what you did last summer, of which only the first part really deserved to be seen and was just surfing on the worldwide success of Scream. Killer game (There's Someone Inside Your House) will not revolutionize the slasher genre but it is an undeniable success and shows once again that Netflix is capable of offering us excellent films such as those we can discover in theaters.  While the new chapter of the Halloween saga will arrive on October 15 in the United States (October 20 in France) and we will have to wait until January 2022 to discover the new chapter of Scream, There's Someone Inside Your House is certainly a perfect movie for Halloween and a slasher of a formidable efficiency.

There's Someone Inside Your House
Directed by Patrick Brice
Screenplay by Henry Gayden
Based on There's Someone Inside Your House by Stephanie Perkins
Produced by Shawn Levy, Dan Cohen, James Wan, Michael Clear
Starring Sydney Park, Théodore Pellerin, Asjha Cooper, Jesse LaTourette, Diego Josef
Cinematography : Jeff Cutter
Edited by Michel Aller
Music by Zachary Dawes
Production companies : Atomic Monster, 21 Laps
Distributed by Netflix
Release date September 23, 2021 (Fantastic Fest), October 6, 2021 (United States)
Running time :96 minutes

Seen on September 23, 2021 (Fantastic Fest)

Mulder's Mark: