You can’t effectively slow burn to a punchline when the punchline sucks. Or you can but the first 90% of your film may feel a bit worthless afterwards. 

Effective in small bursts but there’s a point about 85 minutes into a 95 minute movie where things finally happen and, as a parent, I’m sorry, make no fucking sense.

These people resign themselves to something that, at least for me, no parent would. I’d sooner die in a burst of rage than sadly cry over what I’d just seen. Most people, I think, would sooner kill themselves. As is, the way the main characters subjugate themselves to the finale felt deeply false and emotionally empty. I walked away with a deep, deep sense of “that’s it?”

There are moments of slow build and characterization built into the first acts but rarely did those discoveries lead to anything. In some ways, this is exactly the kind of annoyingly self-serious horror that a company like A24 is accused of releasing. 

I’m hardly offended, more that this felt like empty posturing and the exact kind of “slow burn” horror that does a disservice to the genre.