Slotherhouse
Written by Bradley Fowler and Cady Lanigan
Directed by Matthew Goodhue
Starring Lisa Ambalavanar, Olivia Rouyre, Sydney Craven and Grace Patterson
Running Time 1 hour and 33 minutes
MPAA Rating PG-13 for Bloody Images, Violence and Language
In Theaters for one evening, August 30 with more releases info TBD
Pick up tickets via Slotherhouse’s official website

by Rosalie Kicks, Old Sport & Editor in Chief

“It’s like a cute Chucky…”

When the most adorable slasher-sloth is toted into a sorority house, it leads to some of the most incredibly spectacular things ever to grace the silver screen.

The moment I found out about the existence of Slotherhouse, I immediately busted out my Nancy Drew™️ blazer, threw on my pleated, plaid, knee-length skirt and grabbed my magnifying glass in search of this mysterious motion picture. Lo and behold with a quick google search I was able to obtain the publicist’s name and acquire a screener. Fortunately my detective work was not done in vain.

Emily (Lisa Ambalavanar) pines to follow in her late mother’s footsteps and become elected president of her sorority. Unfortunately, this is an uphill battle due to the sisterhood being under the thumb of the current president, Brianna (Sydney Craven), an individual that exudes Mean Girls energy. It should come as no surprise that these twenty-somethings have a fondness for follows, likes, and hashtags. As each character is introduced, social media notifications flash across the screen revealing their number of followers and such. I found this method of storytelling to be distracting and inevitably pointless. After about the fourth pop-up I began to ignore the text all together due to my weakened eyes not being able to capture all the information being displayed. I am pleased to report that my ignorance did not cause me to be lost at sea in terms of story.

“You interested in having a new fuzzy friend?”

Nobody dares to cross sosh medes Queen, Briana which makes Emily realize that the only way to win this war is to INFLUENCE the sisters to choose her. Social media plays an important role in this tale as it shows how far Emily in particular will go to gain popularity, which she correlates will inevitably lead to power. Upon meeting a curious man, Oliver (Stefan Kapicic) in the mall, Emily learns that he is in the business of exotic pets. Before parting ways, he plants the seed in her head that if she is looking to raise her numbers on the sosh medes the best way to do so is with a sloth. Emily reluctantly decides to exchange handles with him. Initially she chalks this up as a strange encounter but clearly this is a meeting that won’t easily be shook. When she returns to the sorority house and experiences another dose of Briana, Emily decides that she needs to do whatever it takes to win the prized position of President and contacts Oliver. They arrange an appointment and upon her arrival she finds that Oliver is no where to be found, but the precious sloth is. She carefully scoops the sloth into her arms and skips out the door to begin their lives together.

In a mere sixteen minutes, the sloth who becomes to be known as Alpha makes her first kill. Slotherhouse is anything but a slog as it manages to keep the viewer more than entertained with its flat out ridiculousness. To avoid spoiling your future viewing, I will refrain from revealing some of the absolute bananas moments. I will say this though: what makes these scenes tick is that the filmmaker chose to allow the practical effects do the heavy lifting. Often, computer-generated imagery (CGI) will come off as flat, lacking a realistic or genuine feel and ultimately simply come off as cheap. This is especially true for independently made productions with similar budget constraints such as a Slotherhouse. Given that the team behind Slotherhouse chose the route of puppetry for Alpha, this picture is elevated to the likes of Child’s Play or Gremlins. Without a doubt, Alpha will draw comparisons to the loveable Gizmo. It is so easy to fall for Alpha despite her being a killing machine. Just one look in her eyes or catching her lovely locks blowing in the breeze will manage to cause your heart to swoon. Or as one character so regrettably says, Alpha manages to make you “heart horny” (an example of: I heard this and now you have to).

“Don’t rush take it slow…”

Never did I ever think that I would be rooting for a slaying sloth. Without question, I would murder for Alpha. Which is why it was rather disappointing that many of her kills were relegated to a montage. I feel this method of storytelling did a disservice to the film, as I wanted to witness each of the sisters being snuffed out slowly. Each of the kills were quite thrilling, but I found myself wanting to rewind the footage back so that I could get a closer look due to a mere blink being cause for me to miss out on the carnage. Although, due to the inventiveness of it all, I am willing to move past this. I was also willing to overlook some of the performances. In particular that of Bianca Beckles-Rose that played Zenny. I was not a fan of her portrayal as the “bro” of the sorority house as it at times came off as distracting, but this could be due to some inexperienced direction. When the Psycho reference happened, I was willing to forgive any mistakes.

Often titles such as Slotherhouse are utilized like a carny trick to lure the viewer into watching only to be disappointed by the product. Slotherhouse manages to live up to the absurdity of its title and even showcase a bigger horror than a sloth that kills… that influencers will be the death of us all.

Slotherhouse is playing in theaters for one night only, Wednesday August 30th, before eventually moving to streaming at a date/provider yet to be announced. You can pick up tickets via Slotherhouse’s official website.