BEWARE SPOILERS

We go into every post assuming you’ve already watched the films being discussed. Unfortunately, Ready or Not (2019) is not available anywhere without a premium subscription as of this writing (11/11/2021), but we’re about to spoil the hell out of it anyway. 

Recently, we watched the trailer for Scream 5, and readers, we’re excited! Not just because Neve Campbell, Courteney Cox, David Arquette, and the voice of Ghostface, Roger L. Jackson, are reprising their roles, but also because the team behind this new installment and soft-reboot gave us the 2019 metahorror beauty Ready or Not.

We’ve mentioned Ready or Not before, back in this May metahorror comedy listicle. And today, this smart, campy slashfest, co-written by James Vanderbilt and Guy Busick and co-directed by Matt Bettinelli-Olpin and Tyler Gillet, is the focus of our latest addition in our Dissections series on Satanic Panic horror. In our first article, we laid out the commentary in We Summon the Darkness (2019) on moral panics as evil fundamentalist propaganda. Then we tackled the classic social thriller, Rosemary’s Baby (1968), delving into how it draws clear and direct lines between late-stage capitalism and (fictional) Satanic cults. 

Following in the footsteps of Rosemary’s Baby and other Satanic cult movies, Ready or Not gives its own critique of wealth, class, and privilege. The movie builds on the foundational social and cultural commentary of its predecessors to create a character-oriented story about the corrupting power of status and success. 

Ready or Not is not shy in its criticisms. In all honesty, its critiques are pretty ham-fisted. But that’s part of the fun. The movie’s not exactly sweating the nuance of its social critique. It’s a metahorror slasher comedy about rich people playing a murderous game of hide-and-seek, not your college English professor.

“The Rich Really Are Different”

There’s a lot of research out there about the correlation between wealth (or lack thereof) and compassion (or lack thereof). This Scientific American piece is just one of many that unpacks evidence from multiple studies suggesting the richer you are, the less empathy you have to give. 

The article refers to studies in which drivers of luxury vehicles are more likely to cut others off or speed past pedestrians with little regard for the other person’s safety. It also points to another study in which participants were given a survey that asked questions relating to their wealth and privilege, and at the end were offered as much candy as they wanted from a bowl, with the knowledge that a group of children would get the leftovers. Turns out people with a lot took more candy than people with very little.

The researchers’ takeaway is that, once someone passes a certain wealth threshold, they reach a level of freedom and independence that allows them to self-isolate from the world. They don’t need community, because they already have all they could ever want. Whatever they don’t have is easy to get. To them, sharing resources means enjoying less than what they’ve grown accustomed to. As their learned selfishness rises, empathy declines, all dammed up by their wealth and privilege.

In Ready or Not, forget about the gradual part. Here, as Daniel tells us in the film’s second act, “The rich really are different.” The loss of empathy, the callousness, and the disregard for the well-being of others are reflected in the Le Domas family’s dark pact with the mysterious Mr. Le Bail. (By the way, according to Wikipedia, Le Bail is an anagram for Belial, “a word used in the Hebrew Bible to characterize wicked or worthless, which has become personified as devil.”)

But the loss of those very human qualities of empathy and concern weigh on the souls of the film’s bridegroom, Alex (Mark O’Brien), and his brother, Daniel (Adam Brodie). As a result, we watch two men wrestling with the same moral crisis, both refusing to truly act as they play both sides all the way up to the moment when they’re forced by circumstance to make their choice.

With Alex, we follow a succession of seemingly good deeds that slowly reveal themselves to be motivated by selfishness. And in Daniel, we see a man whose bitter self-loathing ultimately leads him to an act of redemption--not for his family, but at least for himself. Meanwhile, the gradual deconstruction of Grace (Samara Weaving)’s wedding dress traces her disillusionment from the family (and traditions) she’s just married into.

So, yes. This movie is ham-fisted in its social commentary. (As the opening credits roll, the film even drops a few obvious hints about the Le Domas family’s great gaming empire. One game is named Family Ritual, another Secret Criminal.) But that ham-fistedness fits the well-paced balance of quippy, campy, self-aware pulp horror/comedy, all of which is carefully crafted into a film that doesn’t waste a single moment of screen time and pays close attention to the arcs of its three main characters: Grace, Alex, and Daniel. 

Starting Mode

At the start, Grace sits in front of a mirror in her wedding dress, smoking a cigarette, and talking aloud about how excited she is to join the “moderately fucked up” Le Domas family. 

Groom-to-be Alex snorts from the doorway at the word “moderately.” When Grace confesses her desire for acceptance, Alex responds, “Who cares what they think? They’re horrible people. … We could just leave.”

There’s little love lost between him and his estranged family. He and Grace are only celebrating their marriage here because the Le Domas crew is so “big on tradition.” But to Grace, this marriage to the love of her life and gaining a “real, permanent family,” is an absolute dream. She grew up in foster homes. This wedding brings with it a sense of family and stability she’s never had, so not even Helene (Nicky Gaudagni)’s penetrating glare can ruin the day.

Before the ceremony, Daniel comes to fetch them. “It’s not too late to flee, you know? You don’t belong in this family. I mean that as a compliment,” he says, signaling both his compassion for Grace and his faith in the “goodness” in Alex. Daniel, we understand, has always played the role of protective big brother, shielding Alex from the most horrendous parts of their familial traditions. 

Years ago, he hid Alex in a wardrobe while the family hunted Helene’s groom, Charles (Andrew Anthony). Lacking empathy for Charles, though, Daniel gave him up when the man rushed in begging for help. Then the Le Domases dragged Charles’ arrow-riddled body away, Helene following in devastated tears. Daniel’s guilt over that moment has clearly lingered. Now, he’s the only one suitably horrified when Emilie’s kids run through the music room chanting, “Kill! Kill!”

So we begin the game with a blissful and beautiful bride, a prodigal son trying to hide his family’s nefarious traditions, and a bitter, self-hating brother. 

Deconstruction of a Wedding Dress

We catch only glimpses of the apparently gorgeous ceremony and reception because what follows is more important. Yes, what follows is the game and all the fun slasher stuff you turned the movie on for in the first place. But what also follows is Grace’s gradual disillusionment as her insecurities about not belonging come true and she finds herself hunted in The Most Dangerous Game: Satanic Mansion Edition by the very people she thought had become her family. 

Later she learns, to actually join the family, she must play a game. When they all sit down to find out what they’re going to play, Alex’s father, Tony (Henry Czerny), tells Grace the story of Le Domas Family Games. During the Civil War, his merchant seaman great-grandfather set up a successful printing shop that manufactured playing cards. Over three generations, that shop became an absurdly prosperous gaming empire. Tony tells her,

It’s almost as if someone’s watching over us. It all began with a very generous benefactor. And this box. …

He tells her about Mr. Le Bail, a man who shared a mutual passion for games of chance with Great-Grandfather Victor. Mr. Le Bail proposed a wager. If Victor could solve how to open the mysterious box, Mr. Le Bail would fund any endeavor he chose. Victor succeeded, and Le Domas Family Games was born:

Since that time, whenever the Le Domases are presented with a new addition to the family, we place a blank playing card into the box. Our initiate then has the privilege of drawing the card, and Mr. Le Bail will tell us which game to play. 

Daniel’s wife, Charity (Elyse Levesque), played Chess. The brothers’ sister’s husband, Fitch (Kristian Bruun), got Old Maid. But of course, Grace pulls the one bad card in the deck: “Hide And Seek.” 

“So, there’s no way for me to win, right?” She asks once she realizes they really are going to play. Uncomfortable and vague, Tony shrugs, “You could stay hidden until dawn.” “No thank you!” Grace replies, unaware that, if they find her, they plan to sacrifice her in a blood ritual to Mr. Le Bail as payment for the family’s continued prosperity.

The First Transformation

At the game’s start, Alex, in an urgent aside, asks Grace to meet him in the bedroom. Grace waves him off: “No, I wanna play for real. This is so weird!”

So, while the others gather weapons and lockdown the house, Alex frets over his bride’s new status as prey, and Daniel stands by in concerned silence, Grace searches rather gormlessly for a place to hide, ultimately deciding to cram herself into (what turns out later to be a very deadly) dumbwaiter. That dumbwaiter also happens to be a kind of symbolic threshold. 

Eventually, Grace gets bored and climbs out, tearing her dress in the process and entering the beginning of her disillusionment from the Le Domas family (and the film’s second act).

The Second Transformation

The wedding bliss doesn’t really crumble, though, until Alex pulls her into the bedroom. Something’s on his mind, but he doesn’t get to say much before they hear footsteps and drop to the floor, hiding behind the bed. A maid comes in looking for one of the kids, and a shot rings out. Alex’s sister Emilie (Melanie Scrofano) excitedly claims responsibility, yelling giddily until she realizes she’s shot Clara (Hanneke Talbot), one of “the help.”

The family’s not all that upset about the murder that just took place. Instead, they treat it as the first in a series of annoyances brought on by their incompetence--particularly coked-up Emilie’s--in handling weapons and hunting the bride. 

Looking for a way out of killing Grace without having to take a stand, Daniel asks, “Well, if she dies, does this count?” Helene snarls back. “It must be the bride.” So they proceed to remove the corpse and resume their hunt.

Once the couple’s alone again--with Grace properly shell-shocked--Alex finally confesses: “They think they have to kill you before sunrise.” Then, leading her into the servant tunnels, he gives her new footwear. 

The switch from fancy heels to flat sneakers represents her change in status from prospective cultist to ritual sacrifice, but the shoes also allow Grace the ability to run from the family. 

The Third Transformation

The third transformation follows the pair’s first marital spat, in which Grace struggles to understand how Alex could hide the “psycho-killers” truth and he defends with “You wanted to get married” and “You would’ve left.” 

After Alex leaves to disarm the house for her, Grace travels down the tunnel and starts tripping over her dress, so she bends down to rip the length. The evolution from long, elegant, and cumbersome-as-hell wedding gown to shorter, cocktail-like attire affords her even more freedom of movement. And more independence from Alex. 

Post-conversation, she starts to think she might not be able to trust him And while he does sabotage the security system, we start to recognize his motives as more selfishly-minded than loving. 

Shortly after, Daniel finds Grace when he walks into the study to wallow in self-loathing and scotch. Trying to appeal to his humanity, Grace pleads. But all Daniel can offer her is an apology, a drink, and a ten-second head start.

The Fourth Transformation

Grace returns to the game lounge for a gun and ammo, which she slings across her torso Rambo-style, further transforming her outfit from a symbol of her union with Alex into a symbol of her badassness in the face of this compassionless family. (By the way, Samara Weaving has easily become my favorite Scream Queen. Those trilling Xena-like yells? Amazing.)

Around this time, after shutting down the security system by smashing it, Alex is removed from the game by his father and handcuffed to the bedpost. In isolation, he stews, eventually revealing to his mother, Becky (Andie MacDowell), that he left the family because he realized that the normality he felt slicing the throats of goats wasn’t, in fact, normal. 

While not burdened with the guilt that drives Daniel, Alex is concerned over the monster he recognizes in himself.

The Fifth Transformation

The next phase in the continued deconstruction of Grace’s gown comes in the goat barn, right after she punches Emilie’s young son Georgie (Liam MacDonald) in the face for shooting her in the hand. She knocks him unconscious before promptly falling into the pit of goat and human corpses, the dress, ripped and muddy, now a physical symbol of the death of her dreams of marrying into a loving family.

The Sixth Transformation

Grace’s climb out of the pit is one of the most visceral tortures she endures onscreen. The camera rests on a nail protruding from the ledge where the broken door to the pit used to be while Grace dangles by one hand over the remains of a ladder that’s just broken out from under her. Finally, predictably, but no less painful to watch, she throws her other hand--the one that just got shot--onto the ledge, impaling it on the nail. In spite of this, she manages to climb out and rips her one sleeve off to wrap her first real battle wound.

Not long after, Daniel and Emilie arrive at the barn to dump more bodies into the pit. As they toss the servants’ corpses, Daniel’s internal moral struggle starts to bubble over, “We all deserve to die.”

Emilie’s appalled. “My kids don’t.”

Then an awakening Georgie calls to them from a stall and reveals he shot Grace. Bewildered, Daniel demands to know why, but a proud Emilie just embraces her son, leaving him to look on in quiet disgust, point made. 

The Seventh Transformation

Grace’s dress rips again, this time around the back and midriff, when she struggles through the slats of the wrought-iron fence surrounding the Le Domas estate. Once she gets through and runs into the road, she flags down a speeding car for help. The driver only stops to tell her to get off the road before racing away, leading Grace to scream out a tirade that amounts to, “Fucking rich people!”

The Eighth & Ninth Transformations

The dress changes twice more before the film’s end: when Grace rips ribbon off to strangle the butler and when Mr. Le Bail comes to collect and she finds herself covered in in-law gore. Both brothers change twice more before the end too.

When Daniel, who’s come outside to escape the madness, finds Grace in the clearing after the car crash, he tells her, “thanks for crashing the car into my tranquility.” Recognizing his increasing empathy and swaying resolve, Grace, again, pleads. While Daniel admits he doesn’t want her to die, he also argues he “can’t let my entire family die because of you.” Then he knocks her unconscious. 

Grace wakes tied and gagged on the pentagram-shaped table where the game started. The others chant around her, passing a chalice. Tony raises a knife, but before he can plunge it into Grace’s chest, everyone begins choking and gagging on the poison they’ve drunk. 

Daniel’s finally chosen his side. 

And, as the only one willing to confront the evils committed by the family and truly try to help Grace, not out of selfish desire but actual compassion, Daniel is granted the only non-humiliating or extravagant death in the film. Charity, wielding Chekov’s gun (the one she mentions having in her purse when asking for “a weapon made this century”), shoots Daniel in the neck while he stands firm in his decision to protect Grace. Ultimately, Daniel’s growth from sullen, self-loathing alcoholic to compassionate and protective supporting hero frees him from the rest of the family’s fate. Per the eradication clause, he still dies, but he dies redeemed. 

But this also means Alex loses his brother, his protector, and his moral compass. Those losses propel him back into the family. Upon finding his mother bludgeoned, Alex, in lightning-speed, works through all his grief and anger to, at last, embrace his place in this callous family cult. Grace’s personhood is meaningless to him when he realizes, “You won’t be with me after this, will you?” With that knowledge, Alex, in a cold betrayal, gives Grace up to the family so they can finish the ritual. Faced with the end of their relationship now that Grace’s image of him has shattered, Alex follows Helene’s lead, embracing the selfish monster inside: “She’s in here!”

Grace battles for her life. By dawn, she’s still breathing. The family’s lost. And each member spontaneously combusts until only Alex and Grace are left. Alex advances on her, claiming, “I’m not like them. No, you made me better. … I get a do-over, sweetie. And that’s because of you!” 

Only when Grace calls him a “selfish fuck” and asks for a divorce does Mr. Le Bail finally come for the fallen husband. 

In the end, the wedding gown’s deterioration manages to trace Daniel’s moral journey toward redemption, Alex’s selfish descent into cruel madness, and Grace’s gradual realization that this devil-worshipping family sees her as less than human, as a simple sacrifice like any goat in that pit, because their abundant wealth has muted their capacity for compassion. 

She walks out of the house as the fire inside rages on, the white lace now black with dirt, blood, soot, and ash-reminiscent, looking like she’s emerged from the world’s goriest funeral.