‘Mental health is a really serious issue…’
What is the archetypal murder mystery? For my money, it’s a bunch of a rich people in a stately home, the lights go out, someone is murdered, everyone’s a suspect. It’s the world of Agatha Christie. Of Sherlock Holmes. It’s very Victorian, isn’t it? Well, Bodies Bodies Bodies takes this tired old trope and drags it vaping and influencing into the 21st century…
A bunch of rich people are having a party. David (Pete Davidson) is the host. He’s a dickhead. He’s jealous of hot, older guy Greg (Lee Pace) and his ability to open a champagne cork with a ceremonial sword. The rest of the group is made up of various seemingly vacuous young women with axes to grind. When Sophie (Amandla Stenburg), an old friend of the group, turns up unannounced with her girlfriend Bee (Maria Bakalova) it is clear that long buried tensions are ready to rise to the fore once more.
Bodies Bodies Bodies works so well because it’s an excellent murder mystery with a genuinely innovative final reveal and it’s also an excellent YA melodrama in the style of Euphoria in which all the characters are keeping secrets and desperately running away from their various insecurities. It’s funny with the humour never coming at the cost of the scares, it’s suitably bloody and violent and brings together a talented, young cast who are clearly having a blast the whole time. It’s the kind of film that when the credits rolled I wanted to watch it again with the new contextual information that the exquisite conclusion so satisfyingly provides.
This was director Halina Reijn’s second feature and I enjoyed it so much that I will absolutely be checking out Instinct – her 2019 debut film. Bodies Bodies Bodies will delight fans of the traditional murder mystery whilst still having something to offer for new fans of the genre. An uproarious success.