In a Violent Nature (2024)

3 1/2 Stars (out of 4)

Cold Hard Slash

By Jeffrey M. Anderson

Chris Nash's mesmerizing, deliberately-paced horror/slasher film In a Violent Nature may not scare traditional horror fans, but its unique rhythms and compositions ask fresh, intriguing questions about that bloody genre.

A group of friends are camping in the woods. Some of them stumble upon an old fire tower, and discover a locket. Thinking it may be valuable, one of them takes it. It's not long before a vicious undead killer, known as Johnny, crawls from his earthly resting place below the tower to begin a new series of slashings.

A feature writing and directing debut by Nash, who contributed a short to the anthology movie ABCs of Death 2 (2014), In a Violent Nature is likely closer to something like Gus Van Sant's Elephant than it is to Friday the 13th Part 2 (Lauren-Marie Taylor, from that 1981 slasher classic, appears here as a good samaritan).

Shot in the narrow Academy aspect ratio of 1.37:1, much of the movie takes place from the point of view of the supernatural killer as he stalks endlessly through the woods. The movie employs no music score, so the sounds of thunking footsteps and the swishing of bushes and branches (and sometimes engines and other unsettling sounds) moving aside act as music. Until the story gets down to the "final girl," we rarely see non-monster characters in close-up, or even at all; they're frequently off-camera, or out-of-focus and in the distance.

Some of the kills, such as two flirtatious campers next to a lake, are familiar in concept, but in execution, they are drastically different. And a nail-biting final sequence will likely enthrall, irritate, or confuse most viewers. (The movie may be this year's Skinamarink.)

It seems as if Nash wants us to ponder what we're watching here, and why, and what could possibly be the appeal of slasher movies. Or, perhaps, to go one further, maybe it's "nature" itself that is a threat. Regardless, In a Violent Nature is a brilliant movie, perhaps even an "elevated" horror movie, worth seeing more than once and further unpacking.