Review: ‘Abigail’ is Gory, Fun and Has a Great Cast But Could Be Better
★★½
If there’s a perfect example of a two and ½ star movie, it’s “Abigail”; its concept is great, its assortment of cast and characters even greater, each scene feels lively and fun and you’ll no doubt have a good time watching it, but the story itself falls short of expectations and by its last 15 minutes, the film is spitting out too many ideas at too fast a rate that its initial concept feels like an incomplete thought.
Directed by Matt Bettinelli-Olpin and Tyler Gillett (aka Radio Silence, the filmmakers behind “Ready or Not” and the last two “Scream” movies) and written by Stephen Shields and Guy Busick, “Abigail” asks the very important question, what if you kidnapped the ballerina child of who you thought was some wealthy dignitary and she turns out to be Dracula’s kid. Or at least, she may be. The name Dracula is never spoken and the film beats around the bush by saying her father “goes by many names.” Regardless, Abigail is a vampire’s daughter and that can only mean one thing: she too is a vampire.
Radio Silence and their writers use this concept as the foundation for a fun, somewhat silly and very bloody romp through an old dark house with dusty cobwebs, endless hallways and a pool of dead bodies. But the best part of “Abigail” is not the severed heads, exploding bodies and vampirical carnage but rather the eclectic cast of indelible personalities led by Melissa Barrera and Dan Stevens.
In fact my favorite scene in the movie doesn’t involve violence or horror of any kind; it’s the scene where the would-be professional kidnappers unwind a little and get to know each other. The “hard part” of the job, the actual kidnapping, is over and now the team, comprised of six complete strangers, must “wait it out” at some remote mansion for 24 hours. To pass the time, they find the den and kick back with an open bar. Smoking a joint and circling around drunk on a bicycle he found, Dean (the wheelman of the group, played by Angus Cloud) starts making the rounds, guessing what kind of people his accomplishes are. Everyone has a good laugh and entertains Dean’s ideas until Joey (Barrera) chimes in. As the audience is clued in, Joey is far more perceptive and correct than Dean. She guesses: Frank (Stevens) is a former undercover cop turned crook; Rickles (William Catlett) is an ex-marine; Sammy (Kathryn Newton) is a rich girl who ran away from home and became a hacker; Peter (Kevin Durand) is a hired muscle from Quebec paid to rough people up; and Dean? According to Joey, he’s a “sociopath.”
Of course, none of these are their actual names, but instead aliases given to the characters in a reluctant fit by Lambert, the big boss who hired them played by Giancarlo Esposito. The idea is that if no one knows their teammates’ actual names then they can’t rat them out.
This scene works for a number of the reasons. For one, the entire makeup, from the dialogue and the performances to the chemistry amongst the characters, is fantastic and allows the mandatory “meet the crew” scene that comes standard issue with this particular breed of plot not feel so dry and routine. More importantly, in a short amount of time it tells us everything we need to know about these characters and how their dynamic will play out for the rest of the film. Joey is observant, smart, but carries baggage; Frank is slimy, hot-headed and certainly not worth trusting; Peter uses all of his muscles except the one in his head; Sammy is young, naive and doesn’t belong here; Rickles is tough, professional and definitely does belong here; and Dean is the opposite, unprofessional and mouthy.
Of course, there’s one more character I have yet to mention here: the titular ballerina vampire herself, Abigail played by Alisha Weir. A formidable antagonist, Weir delivers a layered performance that captures an old soul forever trapped in the body of a little girl. She taunts, manipulates, embodies a scared child and an aged enemy all so effortlessly, often subtly. Later in the film, after Joey and her crew have managed to trap her in a cage, Abigail delivers an ultimatum: “I will allow two of you to live if you let me out.” When asked if she will tell them who she would spare, the withered and direct way she says “No” could only from someone who has lived for centuries. But Weir gets to be playful too, like the scene where she gets caught off-guard dancing with a headless body like a child playing in her room with stuffed animals.
I’ve spent the bulk of this review discussing the characters more than I have the story and that may be because after a certain point, the story no longer works for me. As I said earlier, the concept itself is great but the way it unfolds lacks consistency and commitment. During an expository moment, we learn Abigail’s father may be Kristoff Lazar, the head of an organized crime syndicate. My heart sank a little during the scene. At first I thought it could be misdirection, something to beef up the mystery as the vampire twist had yet to reveal itself. But after the characters discover Abigail’s true nature, her dialogue not only confirms she is Lazar’s daughter, but also that she acts as an enforcer for the syndicate. It’s not a bad idea, I rather like it actually, but it feels extraneous here, not fleshed out enough and acts as a narrative bandaid to cover the hole left by the decision to not speak the name Dracula. (Besides, the idea deserves its own movie. A crime syndicate run by vampires, like “Scarface” by way of “Dracula”? Count me in.) Distancing Abigail from Bram Stoker’s creation is most likely the filmmakers’ attempt to keep the spotlight on her, and it’s a decision I don’t disagree with. Afterall, it’s Abigail’s film, not Dracula’s. But one has to ask, why include the father at all? Why can’t be it be about just a ballerina vampire?
As the film approaches its final act, it yet again changes gears and introduces another threat that belongs in a different movie, one that is not too dissimilar to the initial concept and its characters but requires a different set of motivations and interactions. By the final scene, the filmmakers try to string these different ideas together but the seems don’t hold because none of them are fleshed out enough to feel satisfying. A twist-and-turns pile-on can be fun but doesn’t always work in a film’s favor; more often, it is better to let a single concept play out.
Overall, I like “Abigail”; it’s an enjoyable movie and I think you should see it. Barrera, Stevens, Weir, Newton, Durand and the rest of the cast, their performances and chemistry together, they’re what makes this movie a lot of fun and a part of me wants to give it three stars based solely on that, but deep down I know it is a two and ½ star movie. There’s an assumption attached to mixed and negative reviews that as a reviewer, if you don’t give a movie three or four stars (or five, if you don’t use the four star scale) that means you hate it and will never watch it again. The truth is I rewatch movies I would give a single star to. Being critical of movie doesn’t mean you dislike nor hold resentment towards it, and as a reviewer, you shouldn’t let liking a movie get in the way of being fully honest about it. If you were to ask me if “Abigail” is the best version of the movie it could be, I’d say “No.” It could be a lot better. Radio Silence and their team nail down a lot of the ingredients. The cast, the gore, the laughs; “Abigail” has all that in spades, but its story leaves a lot to be desired.
