As I’m writing this, A24 has just celebrated its tenth anniversary. The critically adored company has built its brand on unconventional indie films, from horror (The Witch) to thriller (Uncut Gems) to sci-fi (Ex Machina) to intimate personal drama (The Florida Project). They’ve built a small but loyal fanbase on the promise of distinct and innovative cinema, and it’s been paying off for a decade and counting.
2022 has been a particularly strong year for the studio, with some of their most widely acclaimed films yet. Everything Everywhere All at Once, the ingenious dimension-bending action comedy starring Michelle Yeoh, has become their most financially successful film ever, while Marcel the Shell with Shoes On has adapted a series of popular YouTube shorts into a feature-length tear-jerker. In both these films, A24 has taken thoroughly ludicrous setups – both of which amusingly feature inanimate objects with googly eyes – and made viewers bawl their eyes out.
Bodies Bodies Bodies is not a film destined to garner the same audience recognition as Everything or Marcel, but it deserves mention as another remarkable film in A24’s oeuvre. The film’s main barrier to wide viewership, I’d reckon, is its tone. Whereas Everything Everywhere is hopeful and optimistic, Bodies Bodies Bodies is mean-spirited and at times downright cynical. But this is all part of the film’s twisted appeal – those who can buy into its premise will discover a wickedly funny horror film, and one of the most whip-smart social satires to come along in years.
The story centers on a group of post-millennial college coeds who all convene for a glitzy mansion party held by the uber-pampered David (Pete Davidson) on the night of a foreboding hurricane. The upper-class Sophie (Amandla Stenberg) invites her immigrant girlfriend Bee (Maria Bakalova) to the event, where they meet with the tightly wound Jordan (Myha’la Herrold), melodramatic Emma (Chase Sui Wonders), and showboating Alice (Rachel Sennott), who is all too happy to bring along her fortysomething boyfriend Greg (Lee Pace). When the storm hits, the friends pass the time indoors by playing the titular parlor game, a murder-mystery romp in which players alternate as killers and victims. But then a blackout hits, the lights go down – and the game suddenly morphs into chilling reality, as dead bodies begin piling up one by one.
As with all great A24 films, Bodies Bodies Bodies can be appreciated on two distinct levels. It is an incredibly taut, gripping, and suspenseful whodunit, making great use of dim lighting and claustrophobic spacing – the posh and expansive mansion turns into a deathtrap, with danger lurking around every turn. The film runs just 90 minutes, wasting no time in setting up and defining its characters before the scares begin – and from that point on, the story doesn’t let up. It’s one of the year’s most absorbing and entertaining movies, helped immeasurably by skillful direction and a terrific young cast. (Sennott, who earned applause for last year’s amusing discomfort comedy Shiva Baby, is the standout.)
But on a deeper level, Bodies Bodies Bodies is a dark and subversive cultural satire, providing some of the funniest social commentary in a motion picture this side of Knives Out. Despite the surmounting tension throughout the film, there were plenty of moments that had me in stitches. (And only me, as there was unfortunately no one else at my late-night screening.)
Bodies Bodies Bodies has been described as a true Gen Z horror film, a badge which goes beyond the youth of its leads. While there are scares to be found in the violence and impending deaths, the film’s most potent horrors come from the way it spotlights the smartphone generation – those whose adolescence has been defined by social media, by likes and shares and insta-gossip. The era of labels and language police, which has popularized identity politics and created a victimhood ladder of which everyone is desperate to grab the topmost rung. The era in which the greatest insult a a young woman can lob at her friend is to accuse her parents of being “upper middle class.”
Fans of the cult sitcom Search Party (which ran two terrific seasons on TBS followed by three turbulent seasons on HBO Max) will recognize this brand of gleefully macabre comedy. That series mined much comedy from Gen Y, focusing on a group of pampered, narcissistic millennials whose foibles continually blinded them to the warning signs of the outside world, dragging them further and deeper into self-inflicted chaos. Bodies Bodies Bodies treads similar ground for the next generation, with a cruel but hilarious look at college-aged American youth. (Emphasis on “American.” Bakalova’s character, a Russian immigrant, is new to the culture wars and baffled by her friends’ accusations of ableism and cultural insensitivity; at times, she feels like the closest thing the film has to an audience surrogate.)
There are so many ways for a film like Bodies Bodies Bodies to go wrong, for it to take cheap shots and simply come off as rudely reactionary. (Granted, this is probably what drew me to the film in the first place, and why plenty of other viewers stayed away.) But the writing is too sharp, the actors too magnetic, to come off as anything but genuine. And the film’s brief runtime allows it to touch all the bases and hit all its targets without feeling needlessly draggy or pretentious.
As indicated up top, Bodies Bodies Bodies was not a hit in theaters, earning a meager $13 million at the box office. But as the film heads to VOD and streaming, it seems tailor-made to develop a following. Some will agree with its messaging, others may be turned off by its cynicism. But it’s among the most audacious films of 2022, and a fine feather in A24’s cap. Here’s to the next ten years.
Critically Touched 