‘Happy Death Day’ Is A ‘Groundhog Day’ Slasher Film And It Looks Great

There is a lot to enjoy in the trailer for upcoming horror flick Happy Death Day.

First up, there’s the hilariously terrible names, which extend not just to the film itself but its hero, Tree. I will never understand a world in which the name Tree gets through multiple levels of film production.

There are the expected horror tropes: creepy masked killer; someone saying “oh lol, you scared me!” to a stranger seconds away from stabbing them; young people having sex (!!).

Finally, there’s the plot itself, which, however derivative, is Grade A horror material. Tree wakes up in some random dude’s room, does the walk of shame/stride of pride, later heads to a party, meets her death, and TWIST: wakes up in the exact same, random dude’s room.

Yep, it’s Groundhog Day: The Slasher Film, and it looks fucking great.

But as horrific as Tree’s story sounds, it’s important to remember that Groundhog Day already was a horror film. Bill Murray spent at least 3,000 days in his unique little hell (which was still less than the original script’s 10,000 fucking years), much of which was, in one of the most depressing sequences in cinema history, spent killing himself.

Also, at least Tree has some kind of purpose inside her purgatory; she has to prevent her murder, which, unless the film is especially cruel, will end the cycle. Murray just kind of kept plodding along, until he randomly broke it by becoming a (urgh) better person.

–

Happy Death Day is out October 13, because of course it is.