7/22/20 - One Must Fall (2018) - 3-/10

Supposedly a horror comedy, but it lacked being either with any conviction or skill. It just kind of dragged on without much of a point. Tonally, it is all wrong and can’t figure out whether to piss or sh*t itself, because getting by without either wasn’t an option.

The desired setting in an 80s slasher environment could have been good, but they don’t lean into it except with vintage food, beverage and small appliance flourishes (some of all of those they get wrong). In fact, so much of the methodology, the dialogue, and the characters are anachronistic. Makes it just feel sloppy and put upon.

It also had good possibilities with a ready-to-serve Brie Larson-lite/Sarah Paulson-lite, but she was given nothing to capitalize upon. I think she was pretty decent, but you can only push the fetid corpse innards up a wall so far before they fall back down upon you.

What is the point of this film? It certainly has nothing to do with the disgusting pig boss stereotype (“Oh, how 80’s”). Was it the fortune cookie philosophy serial killer? Did it have anything to do with the time frame or genre? Did it have anything to do with the job? Or what about the gruesome endpoint for our protagonist? It is a resounding NO to all of the above, which without the hilarity, the horror, or the holistic fulfillment, there is nothing here.

Pretty much a B-movie pretending to be worth a damn. But at least those B-movies come across and might actually entertain, while this decays slowly without hope of cleanup.