Ready or Not 2: Here I Come and They Will Kill You

Could there possibly be a reason that movies about evil rich people sacrificing and hunting the poor for their own enrichment and amusement are showing up in our cinemas right now? Amoral elites demonstrating a sort of ignoblesse oblige? A shout of “Yes, kings!” before they release the hounds? It is unfortunately above my paygrade to opine on such matters, but two films released within about a week of each other have clearly noted corruption and cruelty in the zeitgeist. Ready or Not 2: Here I Come and They Will Kill You share similar plots, and they’re both surprisingly stylish and entertaining.

After surviving the attempts of the strange and wealthy Le Domas family to kill and sacrifice her to the demonic Le Bail in Ready or Not, Grace (Samara Weaving) finds that (as the last surviving member of the Le Domas clan) she’s been entered into an even bigger lethal game of hide and seek. Billionaire cult members from around the globe have gathered to hunt her down, with the prize being world control. But Grace is harder to kill than they imagine, and this time she has her estranged sister Faith (Kathryn Newton) by her side to even the odds. 

Weaving is fine here, but seemed to be having a better time in the first film. Newton holds her own in the endurance and kicking ass contest, and Elijah Wood is quietly amusing as the devil’s lawyer administering the contest. Sarah Michelle Gellar is a welcome presence in a performance that seems like a more mature version of her character in Cruel Intentions, and Shawn Hatosy (currently playing a nice, competent doctor on The Pitt) really goes for it and excels as her stupid, brutal brother. 

Writer/directors Matt Bettinelli-Olpin and Tyler Gillett (along with co-writers Guy Busick and R. Christopher Murphy) keep the initial film’s momentum going by attempting to go bigger (global stakes, more characters). Although I liked this movie more than I was expecting, bigger doesn’t equal better. The first flick was a stylish, perfectly crafted gem, while this one is an amiable goof coasting on the goodwill created by its forebear. 

They Will Kill You: Ten years ago, Asia (Zazie Beetz) and her younger sister Maria were on the run from their abusive father. They got caught, and Asia ran, while Maria was forced to remain with their dad. In the present day, Asia is applying for a job as a maid at exclusive building The Virgil. She meets her odd boss, Lilith (Patricia Arquette), and one of the tenants, Sharon (Heather Graham), and goes to bed in her new room. She’s attacked by hooded strangers that night but manages to fend them off. It turns out that The Virgil is home to a satanic cult of immortal rich people, and she was meant to be the latest sacrifice. Asia, however, has tracked Maria (Myha’la) there, and means to finally save her little sister.

Beetz, whom I’d primarily known for her comedic and dramatic work on Atlanta, proves herself to be a credible action hero here. Myha’la, who plays an antihero finance wunderkind on Industry, succeeds at being more vulnerable in this role. Graham is game for craziness as frequently killed cultist Sharon, but Arquette tries out a supposedly Irish accent that is more distracting than convincing.

Writer/director Kirill Sokolov (co-written with Alex Litvak) has created a visually vivid and inventively gory horror comedy that will be a delight to anybody who enjoyed the Sam Raimi Evil Dead movies. The action set pieces buzz with kinetic energy, and the set piece sequences are fantastic, from a spectacular kill involving a flaming axe to watching a single eyeball painstakingly follow a woman through the building. I’m not even mentioning the possessed pig head on a stick!

It’s depressing that the plots of these films seem to correspond to our reality these days, but one may take heart in the fact that at least in the movies, eventually the villains’ deals with the devil inexorably come due.