Part of the allure of something like a slasher is to see what tropes exist, how the movies are similar, how they’re different. The idea of “what do you do with this thing that is inherently prewritten, but can still be unique“?
It’s interesting that horror tropes exist in all genres, but they are are only known in a few. People talk about slasher as the most trope filled horror sub genre. What about ghost movies, what about devil movies, what about anything else? I had an idea like “I should see all of the animal attack movies” in part because I’m curious, does it have its own tropes and if it does, what are they.
Also, I recently went through all of the Video Nasty, and now I’m going through my whole list of every movie I’ve ever added... This is proof my brain has always worked this way. It’s the “let’s investigate all of this one specific thing”. I’m sure at times, the list contained more animal attack movies and I have whittled them down. Such as Dogs, and my ultimate search which was the Tippi Hedren movie Roar, of which I read the book. Still need to see.
Play Dead follows the near supernatural angle for an animal attack movie. Jilted and jaded elder woman Hester has a new Rottweiler named Greta, and uses voodoo or black magic or incantations or something or other to will the dog to her power. In this case its increasingly suspicious looking deaths. The dog causes a car accident, it puts a hair curler in a tub, uses its leash to choke a guy, and eventually people catch on while the body count stacks up.
Its well executed and minimal in scope. Its believable and is more a of thriller or a character piece almost. Its not going to change your life but its good within it's realm. 4 stars.
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