‘They’ll Kill You’ review: Zazie Beetz kicks ass in a giddy, gory rich-eating thriller

Eventually, a distraught detective asks one of the survivors what just happened. The victim, beaten, exhausted and covered in blood, utters only two words: “Rich people.”

This relates to the extent of social commentary on offer They will kill youa new horror-thriller comedy set in a luxury building in Manhattan, whose Satan-worshiping tenants engage in ritual murders of their poor and often marginalized employees. But this is all an excuse for writer and director Kirill Sokolov (Why don’t you just die!) and co-writer Alex Litvak needs to unleash a big, big, gonzo-style arterial splash, to make an enjoyable, if ultimately insubstantial, effect.

Arrived after only one week Ready or Not 2: Here I come It hit theaters — and debuted at SXSW just a few days later Ready or Not 2: Here I come an act – They will kill you It will inevitably draw comparisons. It is impossible to say that they are not fair.

Both films revolve around ordinary women who are brought into a heavily guarded enclave of the one percent, where they are hunted down for sacrifice by sociopaths who have made a literal deal with the devil. Both films pair their heroines with estranged younger sisters who constantly resent their older sisters’ abandonment of them in their youth, but must now make up for them in order to survive. Both films turn into frenetic but stylish brawls using all sorts of unusual weapons before coming face to face with supernatural forces.

But any assumption that they are same The film will be erased the moment Satanists wear satin They will kill you Asia (Zazie Beetz), the newest maid at Virgil’s exclusive apartments, is in a closet – only to come out literally swinging a sword, severing one of their heads clean to open the first of what will be many, many fountains of blood to come.

We learn through a flashback that Asia is not an oblivious victim, but rather an “avenger,” as her boss (Lily, played by Patricia Arquette) puts it, with an exasperated sigh that suggests she is not the first. Asya came here under false pretenses with the aim of saving her sister Maria (Mihala), another recently hired maid. She is thus armed to the teeth with blades, guns and ammunition, though perhaps nothing deadlier than her fighting spirit, honed over years of prison brawls. The residents of Virgil, for their part, are more than willing to defend their property, with a major supernatural asset up their broad sleeves giving them the upper hand.

Simplicity of the plot – the only way out is to escape the fire at the top of the building, forcing Asia to fight her way up the nine floors, similar to… Raid: Redemption or Dread – gives Sokolov a relatively blank canvas on which to spray a big, bloody palette of everything he’s ever found fascinating, from video games to anime to… John Wick By Sergio Leone and Quentin Tarantino. If he has not yet combined all these influences into his own distinctive style, he uses them with delightful enthusiasm. He demands violence up to Looney Tunes The silliness while Beetz pulls it all off with effortless grace, giving Asia an athleticism that makes her fun to watch and a challenge that makes her fun to root for.

Asia never swings an axe when she can swing one Flaming The ax so she can set her enemies on fire even when she cuts off their limbs. Furniture being tossed into the air is captured in slow motion, and is best admired when it crashes onto someone. The gunshots are punctuated by gusts of mattress padding that fall into the air like snow. And I haven’t even revealed the major twist that explains the film’s most horrific scenes; These, I’ll leave you to look at in the theater yourself.

But even with this endless appetite for mayhem — and even with a short 94-minute runtime — there’s a point They will kill you It starts with leaving interesting ideas on the table in favor of repeating themselves. Take the building layout. We’re told that each floor bears the theme of a different deadly sin, but aside from a brief glimpse of a writhing orgy on the “damned floor” (lust, obviously) and a set piece in an empty kitchen (gluttony, presumably), we don’t get to see any of the others. Instead, we spend a lot of time crawling around dark underground tunnels and climbing nondescript passages. It seems like a missed opportunity to set Virgil apart from any of the millions of lanes we’ve seen action stars make their way before.

Then there are the characters. They will kill you He barely bothers to flesh out the masses of masked villains; The characters played by Heather Graham and Tom Felton are only recognizable because they are played by Heather Graham and Tom Felton. But she cares less about main characters like Maria, whose motivations change with the needs of the plot. Or that Lily and her husband Roy (Patterson Joseph), who I can’t tell you almost anything other than that Arquette, apparently decided mid-shooting to go for a “local newscaster on St. Paddy’s Day”-level Irish accent, and Joseph to pick up a nice Southern accent.

Even the haves versus have-nots situation turns out to be less about exploring social injustice and more about allowing us to support extreme violence without feeling guilty, safe in the knowledge that these haves aren’t actually like the rest of us because they’re so much worse.

But maybe it’s for the best. For all the weapons in Asia’s arsenal, thought, emotion or sophistication are none of them. They will kill you It simply isn’t equipped to deliver a nuanced exploration of class division, a poignant drama about brotherly devotion, or the like. What it has been weaponized for is violence – lots and lots and lots of violence, which is so bad that it reverts to childish laughter. It’s a joy to be presented on a massive scale, with enough enthusiasm to satiate even the most bloodthirsty moviegoer.