Scream Stream 2023: Slotherhouse

Emily (Lisa Ambalavanar) wants to be popular more than anything.  Not just popular, she wants to be president of her sorority, like her mother was, and she wants to be an internet influencer, but she doesn’t have the “follows” to accomplish either of those things, constantly over shadowed by “rich bitch”, Brianna (Sydney Craven).  When an opportunity arises to adopt a cute, slow moving sloth and make it the sorority mascot, Emily takes it and starts to get everything she dreamed of.  But slowly, some of the endless number of sorority sisters, specifically those who support Brianna for president, begin to disappear, although most of the girls are so wrapped up in their own little lives that they barely notice.  The one voice of reason is Madison (Olivia Rouyre), who believes that taking a wild animal and trying to domesticate it is wrong.  Eventually, the girls all realize that their cute pet sloth whom they have named Alpha, is not only beyond intelligent, but maniacally, maliciously murderous.  Alpha, who seems to have more lives than Michael Meyers in Halloween, goes on a rampage, killing all the “sisters” that she comes across.  Can Emily save her friends and escape the not so slothful sloth? Watch and find out!

This movie is dumb, and it is supposed to be.  The concept came from writer Bradely Fowler, who wanted to come up with the dumbest idea he could, and he was very successful.  The movie is farcical with a sloth that is not only overtly more aggressive than it should be but also infinitely more intelligent than other animals, including the sorority sisters (which may be the most believable thing in the movie).  To the point where it uses the internet, takes selfies, and drives a car, even speaking a word or two by the end. The film also builds on the stereotypical “mean girl” model, with Brianna being rich and entitled and all around mean to everyone, but still immensely popular and Emily being the shy nice girl who does something stupid to earn notoriety.  The amount of disbelief that must be suspended to watch this movie pushes the limits even for a farce.

The performances are all pretty good, including Alpha’s puppetry.  The idea and story, had potential, but the realization of these ideas lacked a bit in its execution. There is no explanation why this sloth was so aggressive, and it is alluded to that all sloths are misunderstood and are intelligent murderous creatures, which I feel does a disservice to sloths who are naturally gentle animals.  There were a lot of missed opportunities with what they could have done with a murderous sloth.  This may have been due to the fact that Alpha is not CGI, but obviously a puppet. This was a purposeful choice made to pay homage to the classic horror films use of practical effects, which for the most part, works, but it does limit what we can visually see Alpha actually doing.  One aspect of the film I really did like was the way social media was displayed on the scene with each character showing how many followers they had.  This added a bit of depth to the story, commenting on our current obsession with influencers and the power they hold over us. This is not the worse movie I have seen, but I am not sure it is worth some of the praise it is getting, and I am just praying that we don’t get a “Slotherhouse II”.