‘Slotherhouse’ is a comedy horror that follows Emily - a college senior who wants to become president of her sorority. In order to stake her claim to the post, Emily rescues and takes in a sloth who, unknown to her, turns out to have a sinister side to her.
Just as the title of the film would suggest, the premise of the story is utterly ridiculous. As Emily (Lisa Ambalavanar) and her friends Madison (Olivia Rouyre) and Zenny (Bianca Beckles-Rose) take on their final year of college, Emily wants to achieve the same social heights as her mother had before her - to become her sorority’s president. To gain notoriety and appeal to the wider crowd, Emily gets in touch with an animal dealer. On visiting the dealers house however, things have already taken a turn, where having spotted the sloth, Emily flees the scene not knowing the sloth had attacked the poacher.
After introducing the animal to the rest of her sisters, Emily shoots ahead of front-runner Brianna (Sydney Craven). Following a by-the-numbers montage of the two competing and the sloth killing seemingly at random, the film switches gears and amps up the absurdism, as the sloth exhibits unusual behaviour, namely a human level of intellect and Machiavellian tendencies when carrying out her murders.
Taking one ridiculous turn after the other, the film has a field day and takes every opportunity to go over the top and call itself out, with one of the characters actually dropping the film title, much to the chagrin of the bystanders. As the story wears on, the girls discover the sloth is dangerous and arm themselves to kill her, at which point the film has three (or even more) fake-outs where the sloth is seemingly fatally injured only to escape and return later to keep pestering the girls, exhibiting super speed and almost a superhuman ability to move from one place to the other.
The film even closes with a further cliff-hanger, where the sloth has made her way back home to Panama, only to be spotted near a group of tourists, suggesting she’ll be slothering for as long as there are human (or other) nuisances around. With a Michael Myers level of resilience and persistence, the sloth exhibits no reason for why she is the way she is, but rather kills with glee and no prior motive, making her more sinister than one could ever have anticipated a sloth to be.
Running in parallel to the ludicrous nature of the killer mammal, the cast of Ambalavanar, Rouyre, Beckles-Rose and Craven fulfill the requisite roles of college friends, nemesis and final girls. The relationship between Ambalavanar and Craven adds to the clichéd tropes on frenemies and provides for the backdrop on which both of them can grow and develop, improving their characters and relationship by the end of the feature.
What works best for the film is its characters and their reaction to the situation they’re in – acknowledging that there is a murderous sloth on the scene garners almost no reaction, only to the extent that the girls have to get it together to kill her. Not a single mention of why the sloth is the way it is makes the film fun, with the most joy being derived from the film based on the viewers ability to suspend their disbelief and go all-in on the farcical nature of the story.
Slightly incoherent, but always ridiculously fun, ‘Slotherhouse’ manages to deliver on a few hilarious moments and knows not to take itself too seriously. With it being dubbed a horror comedy, the film doesn’t care to provide for genuine scares, rather focusing on the played-out nature of jump-scares and ripping on a few, well-known chase choreography scenes. Very self aware and absurd, ‘Slotherhouse’ is as fun as you’re willing to let it be, best enjoyed with a group of like-minded people.
Score: 3/4
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