Emma Vine
When the trailer for Slotherhouse was released earlier this year, I felt intrigued by the concept. As an animal lover and someone fascinated by sloths, I couldn’t help but wonder why the filmmakers wanted to center a slasher around an adorable species that is anything but intimidating. However, as the minutes ticked by, the feature’s underlying message became clear as day, and its ability to balance a serious environmental issue alongside one of the most ridiculous premises that one could conjure up makes it a worthy contender for one of the best horror films of 2023.
Creature features are nothing new, but their outlandish nature makes for a fun time and is what keeps audiences coming back for more. During my childhood, the 90s saw the popularity of cult classics such as Deep Blue Sea, Lake Placid, and Anaconda, to name a few. Earlier this year, we saw a bear high on cocaine stalking its victims in Elizabeth Banks’s Cocaine Bear. Even a beloved Disney character was turned into a killer in Winnie The Pooh: Blood and Honey, and at the beginning of August, Meg 2: The Trench was released after the first film based on the prehistoric shark saw such success. The point is that these bizarre stories are fan favorites as they create some of the best entertainment in cinema.
Please make no mistake that Slotherhouse knows what it wants to be and proudly wears its over-the-top badge with pride. The film is by no means scary, but that’s not the angel here. Instead, it relies heavily on humor, showcasing the lengths people go to in order to achieve what they desire and the importance of wildlife preservation, all of which is achieved effortlessly.
Slotherhouse’s opening scene cuts right to the chase as viewers are transported to Panama and witness an adorable sloth poached from its natural habitat and transported to the USA. It grabs your attention instantly and makes you think about the environmental repercussions of taking a wild animal from the place it calls home. Was the decision for the ferocious killer to be a sloth due to the fact that Slotherhouse is a pretty great play on words? Perhaps, though, I think the more apparent message is not to judge a book by its cover and that animals are unpredictable in an unfamiliar environment.
When we are introduced to Emily (Lisa Ambalavanar), she wants nothing more than to be the president of her sorority and craves popularity among her peers to achieve that goal. Slotherhouse cleverly reflects society’s obsession with social media and the desire for instant gratification and attention through follows, likes, and comments.
After saving a dog at the mall and immediately snapping a photo of the event for her socials right after, Emily meets Oliver (Stefan Kapicic), who offers to sell her a pet sloth as a way for her to gain popularity after she sees the cutesy creature on his Instagram page. The most alarming part is that she asks no questions of the stranger offering up this exotic animal, such as how he came to own the mammal, what it eats, or the traits it possesses, further highlighting the narrative of being egocentric and not considering the weight of one’s actions.
As you may have guessed, things take a turn for the worse after Emily brings the newly adopted houseguest and elected mascot, who is named Alpha, to the sorority house, and what takes place after that makes the 93-minute runtime worth the time investment. Slotherhouse does a decent job with pacing and gives viewers a look at the competitive atmosphere among the sorority sisters before Alpha goes on her killing spree.
The characters in Slotherhouse aren’t all that likable, but this decision feels intentional as it adds to the comedic angle of the film and reflects the selfishness of the humans surrounding Alpha. With that being said, each individual has a purpose in the story. Emily’s journey reveals that abandoning your morals for popularity isn’t worth it in the long run. Meanwhile, our leading lady’s good friend Madison (Olivia Rouyre) is the voice of reason who tries to bring Emily back down to earth while she attempts to do the right thing and return Alpha to her home.
The murders in Slotherhouse are mild and lacking in the gore department, which is to be expected due to the film’s PG-13 rating, and this may disappoint viewers hoping for a full-on slasher fest. In fact, most of the kills aren’t shown, but we see the aftermath once Alpha’s work is done, and to be fair, some of the kills are comedically creative. Most graphic scenes, which aren’t even that graphic, include a few blood spurts while Alpha shows off her murder weapon, which consists of her three sharp claws.
However, the feature excels in its use of comedy leading up to each kill and embraces its bizarreness while creating some laugh-out-loud moments that make you root for the slaying sloth. In a montage of kills, we see Alpha hiding among various cuddly toys in a sorority sister’s bedroom before pouncing on the helpless victim, leaving one of the housemates dead on an exercise ball, and zipping one of the girls up in her sleeping bag before tossing her off of the balcony.
Even when Alpha isn’t killing, the filmmakers still lean into how intentionally over-the-top the feature is meant to be. Somehow, the sloth is so intelligent that she can post selfies on her social media account, use a laptop, and even drive a car. During these moments, the decision to use practical effects for Alpha makes such scenes even more realistic, effective, and a laugh riot, as she’s physically present on-screen.
There’s no denying that Slotherhouse won’t be a film for everyone, especially horror fans who prefer their slashers to be absent of comedy and able to deliver genuinely frightening material that keeps you up for days. However, the feature reflects the devastating effects of poaching while presenting viewers with an adorable, unique killer sloth unlike anything we have ever seen before, and I’d say that’s a pretty remarkable achievement.
