[Movie Review] Until Dawn (2025)
Plot Summary: Five friends on a road trip stop at a deserted building in the sleepy town of Glore Valley. They find themselves reliving the same bloody night, each time with new horrors. The rules are simple: survive until dawn and you can escape. But can our protagonists survive with the odds—and a mysterious character—against them?
Runtime: 103 minutes
Director: David F. Sandberg
Writers: Blair Butler, Gary Dauberman
Main Cast:
- Ella Rubin as Clover
- Michael Cimino as Max
- Odessa A'zion as Nina
- Ji-young Yoo as Megan
- Belmont Cameli as Abel
- Maia Mitchell as Melanie
- Peter Stormare as Hill
Review by: Lauren
Until Dawn, directed by David F. Sandberg, presents itself as both an adaptation of a video game and a twist on the horror genre. I’ll leave the question of the faithfulness of the adaptation to the gamers and sink my own teeth into the effectiveness of the film itself.
Our tale follows five friends (or rather four friends and one new boyfriend) on a road trip, which is later revealed to the audience and Abe (Belmont Cameli), the new boyfriend, to be a front for a journey to retrace the steps of Melanie (Maia Mitchell), the sister of our would-be final girl Clover (Ella Rubin). The film proceeds to hit all the familiar horror beats: ominous storm, ominous abrupt wall of rain, ominous historic house museum welcome center (you get the point). Upon entry, the crew gets right to work splitting up and exploring, just like we knew they would. After a bloody night that results in the death of our young protagonists, the twist comes—they reawaken and are forced to fight for their lives, over and over, unless they can make it…until dawn.
What I liked:
I must admit, I love camp, and I love a good trope; one that has been so run into the ground, that it miraculously resurrects like Christ on the third day, beloved by the horror acolytes. Until Dawn has no shortage of such tropes. You might expect a film that relies so heavily on tropes, but lacks in so many other areas, to drag the whole project down. However, here, the trope is its saving grace. It hits all the good horror beats we know and love: perfectly timed trips and falls, fun and bloody kills, and spooky, cursed towns.
What I didn’t like:
As previously mentioned, the film wants so desperately to sell the “twist” (revealed in the trailer), but ultimately the premise falls flat as the stakes are revealed to be of little consequence.
Friendship and collective survival as the prime motivators felt incredibly hollow. The script was serviceable and not too shabby with the comedic bits, but it certainly did not convince me that this was a complex group of individuals with an unbreakable bond. New boyfriend was right in his constant criticism of the “one band, one sound” approach.
Summary
Definitely not a must-see, but a passable “friends go to a haunted house” film. I recommend it if you enjoy camp and a good horror trope.
