Until Dawn--My Take On The Movie With Spoilers!
Plot: Five friends find themselves trapped in a time loop when they enter a remote cabin while searching for a missing friend.
Based on the hit PlayStation game, Until Dawn is a thrilling horror movie that will immerse you in the story as soon as it begins. However, the movie becomes repetitive and jumbled in the third act, leading to a dull reveal and a predictable ending.
UNTIL DAWN Movie Plot Summary
The movie begins with Melanie running about through the tunnels, being chased by a masked killer. She manages to make it out and pleads with the masked man, but he brings down his pickaxe on her anyway.
We then move on to five friends: Clover (Melanie's sister), Max, Megan, Nina, and Nina's boyfriend Abe. Max is Clover's ex who is still hung up on her and wants her back.
Clover thinks she has found the last location Melanie was in and wants to go find her. Her four friends are willing to support her and join her on this road trip.
When they stop at a gas station, Clover finds a man and shows him a photo of Melanie, asking him whether he has seen her sister. He answers in the negative but makes a strange remark about Clover looking a lot like her and that several people have gone missing in this area over the years.
Clover thinks he's a freak and leaves. The friends go about on their way when the storm begins. They find a house in the middle of nowhere. They decide to take shelter there and look around the place.
Clover thinks she hears Melanie's voice and goes walking through the rain.
In the house, Nina finds a guest register book, but no one else is around. There is an hourglass that is almost out of sand.
She sees that several people have written their names repeatedly in the book, and after each entry, their writing has become squiggly.
She notices Melanie has also signed her name thirteen times.
Megan goes into the bathroom and finds there is no water. She wipes the mirror and looks at her face.
Abe enters a room where there are dozens of missing photos. He finds one of Melanie's as well.
Max pulls back Clover who appears to be in a daze and tells him she saw her sister.
The friends regroup and though it is now confirmed that Melanie was here, they find it odd that the missing posters are only photos without information about the person.
Clover suddenly hears an odd noise and goes to check to find Abe pinned against the wall. As she enters, his body splits in half. A masked killer starts chasing everyone.
Nina is the next to go. Megan's head is smashed by the killer, and a knife is plunged into Max's eye. Clover runs out into the woods but is stabbed in the back by the killer.
The hourglass turns around, and Nina gasps as she finds herself writing in the register again. She sees herself writing her name a second time. At the wall, the upturned hourglass catches her attention, and she asks everyone if they turned it, but no one has.
All the friends find themselves in the same positions as when they came across the house.
Abe wants to leave, but can't spot his truck through the window. He then spots it, but someone turns the headlights on.
Max apologizes to Megan for not believing in her psychic nonsense, but just then her body begins to contort painfully.
The lights flicker, something that didn't happen the last time. Megan is gone from the room, but they find her levitating in the room Abe found the missing posters. Megan points to each poster and speaks in the missing person's voice. The friends are spooked when Megan suddenly collapses and dies.
Clover hears Melanie calling for help, and she rushes to the door. The friends remind her it may be a trick, but she still tries to open the door that was previously barricaded by Abe when it kept opening on its own.
Max believes Clover could be right and opens the door. Clover rushes out, but of course, there is no one there. However, a house has emerged right across from them. On the door, someone has scribbled a curse against the Glore Valley Witch.
Clover is suddenly thrown out of the house and pulled towards the new house. Her friends get too scared and get inside. Max wants to help, but they discourage him.
Max is then killed by a masked killer. Nina and Abe run into the woods but are killed by a monstrous being.
Clover wakes up to find a haggard witch before her. She possesses her and makes her run out. Clover is hit by a ca,r and the day resets again.
The friends are freaked out when they find cuts and bruises on them.
The friends have a meeting in the bathroom, wondering how to escape the loop. Abe turns on the tap and fills a glass with water. Megan is mystified because previously there had been no running water. They all drink thirstily while discussing their next steps.
Abe suddenly coughs and is surprised to see blood and bits in his palm. He secretly wipes his hand on the shower curtain. In the next instant, his coughing fit becomes worse, and he shockingly explodes.
Nina is disgusted that she got bits in her mouth and washes her mouth, but the others quickly deduce that the water may have something to do with it.
Nina explodes next.
The three friends run about, realizing that there is no escaping their eventual death.
Megan's knee pops up first, and she falls. She crawls to them as her stomach bulges. For some reason, her death is really slow. Max and Clover watch her helplessly as she finally explodes.
Clover begs Max to strangle her to save her from a painful death. Max doesn't want to and backs away when he suddenly explodes.
As Clover lies dying, the man from the gas station appears and tells Clover that this isn't the way to go and that she needs to accept her fate. She then explodes. Some of the blood gets on his face.
The night resets, and Clover tells them about the man from the gas station. They find a report on how a mining disaster caused the entire town to collapse and kill thousands of people.
Based on the maps and plans, they find a door that could lead out, but when Clover opens it, she finds a creepy tunnel and decides against using it.
They also find a tape of a man in captivity. The man from the gas station appears who introduces himself as Dr Hill. He explains that as each person repeats the night, they slowly transform into a wendigo. The friends realize that they are being kept here for the same purpose and are terrified of turning into a wendigo.
Dr Hill manages to communicate with them on the radio and tells them that the only one out is if someone sacrifices themselves. He then tells Clover that her sister is with him. Clover goes to look for her, and Max joins her.
Abe suggests that they let Clover die since she had attempted to kill herself anyway. The others are against the idea, and when he persists, Nina kills him with a pickaxe so that the others can go help Clover find Melanie.
Nina and Abe are killed by the masked killer.
Megan gets dragged away by a wendigo.
Clover's foot gets trapped in a bear trap. Max helps her out when Megan appears. When they see she is in Wendigo form, they decide to run. Max manages to encase her head in the bear trap but that doesn't stop her.
Clover and Max are hiding when she suggests that they repeat the night again, as this was a total bust. She asks him to slit her throat.
Max does so and then sees Melanie approach them. He drinks some of the rainwater and goes outside to curse her before he explodes.
The night resets.
We see Melanie leaving for her trip and taunting Clover that she has become a recluse following their mother's death. Clover gives her their mother's necklace and says that she is fine the way she is. Melanie leaves, disappointed.
Clover comes to and finds herself on the couch next to her friends. They claim they had to drag her back into the house.
Abe says his back feels weird and lifts his shirt to show his spine being transformed. His friends lie that he's absolutely normal but are worried about him transforming into a wendigo.
As Clover makes a plan on how to escape, Nina points out that they have relived thirteen times already. She brings out the register and sure enough her name has become squiggly after writing it so many times. Since no one has survived after the thirteenth night, it is safe to assume that it is their last night.
Clover wants to give it her all on this last night. Abe wishes he could remember the other times not shown to us. He wishes there were a way to keep track, and then remembered that he is obsessed with taking videos. He finds short clips of the scenes we have not seen yet. In one, Clover has a worm sticking out of her face that transforms half her face entirely. In the other clip, the friends are seen being attacked by wendigos.
The friends realize Megan is not with them, but find a video of her surviving the night and going to find Dr Hill.
Clover decides to go through the door that leads to the creepy tunnel. She says that since she got them all in this position because of her wanting to search for her sister, she would get them out of it. She would make the sacrifice because her friends are like family to her.
Touched by her speech, the friends decide to accompany her through the tunnel.
UNTIL DAWN Movie Ending Spoilers
The four friends are attacked by wendigos soon enough.
Clover comes face-to-face with Melanie, and after a short fight, impales her on debris, killing her.
The friends see Megan in a locked room, tied up to a chair. On the wall, in chains, is a Wendigo trying to get to her.
Clover finds Dr Hill, who has her reports for when she had sought help. He explains his project about using fear and luring people to Glore Valley to perform experiments on him. Disgusted, Clover pushes his coffee cup to where the roof is leaking, and then returns it to its former position. Dr Hill drinks his coffee, realizes something is off, and then explodes as Clover smirks.
The friends are busy fending off Wendigos when Clover comes to save Megan just as the Wendigo is about to free himself.
The friends escape, but not before killing the masked killer.
When they emerge from the tunnel, they see the sky lighting up. Dawn has broken. The friends are safe.
Abe is already in his truck, honking, and they all get in, and then drive away into the sunrise.
In the end, we see the screens in Dr Hill's office showing a truck pulling up to a snowy cabin, indicating that more experiments are taking place around the world. Also, it's the opening scene of the video game.
The movie ends.
Final Thoughts
UNTIL DAWN is an intense movie with some interesting kills. While it isn't devoid of some flaws, like the close-knit group of friends not realizing Megan isn't with them or their phones surviving each night too, the movie, on the whole, is entertaining enough to merit a watch.
Comments
Post a Comment