An Average Movie-Goer’s Review
Spoilers! If you don’t want spoilers – check out the Spoiler-Free post
I love horror movies and if I’m going to watch them anyway, why not write an entertaining/funny review from the POV of an average movie-goer and not a professional critic.
Today we’re looking at 2020’s The Rental – at the time of this post, The Rental is available on Netflix
Two couples go on a weekend getaway to celebrate a business venture but relationships are tested as a serial killer targets them.
Is it Scary?
Do you find relationships scary? Do you find renting a house in a secluded area scary? If so, you’ll be fucking terrified, otherwise nah. There are a few jump scares but they don’t happen till late in the movie and they’re not really effective.
Detailed Plot:
The film opens with two business partners Charlie and Mina, who I incorrectly assumed were a couple, (played by Dan Stevens and Sheila Vand respectively) looking at rental properties for a weekend trip to celebrate getting funding for their business.
Mina’s boyfriend, who is also Charlie’s less successful brother Josh, (played by Jeremy Allen White) then walks in and agrees the trip would be a good idea.
That night Charlie and his wife, Michelle (played by Alison Brie) discuss Josh and Mina’s relationship. We learn that Charlie thinks Mina is “the whole package” and Josh is just a Lyft driver who has dropped out of college and been to jail for assault. But, they both agree Josh is truly in love with her.
The following day Charlie and Michelle arrive to pick up Josh and Mina for their trip and are surprised about Josh bringing along Reggie, the dog, despite pets being forbidden at the rental place.
On their way to the rental house we learn Mina attempted to rent the house through an app prior to Charlie and was denied but when Charlie attempted, he was approved. The group believe the reason for it was due to Mina being middle eastern.
The group arrive at the home and meet Taylor (played by Toby Huss), the renter of the home despite it being owned by his brother. There’s immediate tension between Taylor and Mina that hint at him possibly being racist as he specifically asks how she got mixed up with the family.
While Taylor gives the group a quick tour, Michelle mentions they should have brought a telescope which prompts him to offer to bring his by later.
After Taylor leaves the group settles in and while playing catch with Reggie, Josh finds a room with a keypad lock on it. After a quick jump scare of Mina coming up behind him, they try one time to open the door then leave. So I’m sure that hidden room isn’t hiding any secrets.
Later the group is out on a walk and while Charlie and Mina walk ahead, Josh discusses with Michelle his insecurities about dating Mina. It boils down to him believing he’s a loser and Mina being out of his league.
Michelle assures him Charlie and Mina are just close because of their work and their shared creative sides. Someone is going to cheat on someone, I guarantee it.
Arriving back at the house the group find Taylor has dropped off the telescope and set it up in the house.
Mina is slightly disturbed that Taylor entered the home while no one was there and can potentially do it again as he pleases. The rest of the group think nothing of it and Mina leaves the issue alone.
The group then eat, drink, and plan a hike for the following day. Mina and Michelle reveal they brought ecstasy for them to take but Michelle declines as she’s tired. The rest of the group take the drugs and are soon dancing around the living room.
While Michelle is in bed asleep, the remaining group are looking at the stars through the telescope and Josh goes inside for another drink only for him to fall asleep. Charlie then turns on the hot tub and Mina agrees to join him leading to them drunkenly kissing.
Reggie begins to bark, completely killing the mood, and the two agree to call it a night. We then cut to someone’s POV who is watching them from afar and breathing heavily.
Mina jumps into the shower and Charlie joins leading to the two having sex.
The following morning Charlie and Mina both decline to go on the hike as they are extremely hung over leaving Josh and Michelle to go together. Now free to discuss the events from the prior night (see: cheating) they agree that it can never happen again.
On their hike, Josh and Michelle discuss how each met their respective partners and we learn that Charlie has a habit of cheating on his partners before leaving them. This is something Michelle didn’t entirely know.
Back at the house Mina takes a shower and notices a camera in the shower head.
Believing Taylor is behind the cameras, Mina wants to call the cops but Charlie declines since the investigation will reveal their infidelity. The two agree to just get through the night and leave first thing in the morning to not arouse suspicions.
Michelle and Josh arrive and Michelle argues with Charlie about his cheating habit causing a rift. She then takes ecstasy alone since the rest of the group decline choosing to have a low-key night.
A little while later the group realize Reggie is missing and all, except the high Michelle, go out to the woods looking for him worried that he may have fallen off the nearby cliff. When they return Michelle tells Charlie she called Taylor back to the house since the hot tub wasn’t working.
Josh then believes Taylor might have taken Reggie, which doesn’t make sense since Charlie and Mina would have seen him pulling up but logic meet the window!
When Taylor arrives he makes it clear he didn’t take Reggie and states dogs aren’t even allowed but the conversation is cut short when the still high Michelle asks Taylor to hurry with the hot tub.
After fixing it, Taylor sees Mina outside searching for Reggie and tells her the no pets rule was his brother’s idea and won’t rat them out. Mina then says she wants to show him something and brings him to the bathroom, confronting him about the camera.
Taylor is confused and denies having any part in it. Mina calls his bluff and threatens to call the cops if he releases the footage. This causes the innocent Taylor to offer to call the cops for her but when he attempts to Mina tries to snatch his phone away.
Josh hears the commotion and runs inside immediately tackling Taylor into the bathtub. Charlie and Michelle hear the crash and rush in breaking up the fight but Taylor is now unconscious from the hits he took to the face.
The group step outside and Mina tells everyone about the camera (but doesn’t mention the sex part). Meanwhile inside someone sneaks in and kills Taylor by suffocating him.
The group debate whether they should call the cops and Josh claims it was self-defense, urging Charlie to call. Michelle then goes inside to call as Charlie checks on Taylor finding him dead.
The group believes Josh’s attack led to his death and debate on what to do next, with Michelle being the only one who still wants to call the cops. Charlie formulates a plan to throw Taylor off of the cliff and pretend it was an accident.
Mina points out the camera in the shower head was wireless meaning the receiver and footage would still be somewhere in the house. They agree to find it and destroy it allowing them to get away with their crimes. Michelle refuses to be a part of it and goes into the room.
The rest of the group clean up and drag Taylor’s body to the cliff throwing him over but he lands just slightly below them on some rocks instead of the ocean. Josh then climbs down, almost loses his footing, and pushes the body down.
Back at the house as Michelle packs up, the water from one of the showers turns on. Arriving in the bathroom the shower head turns off but the one in the second bathroom turns on. This continues to happen for suspense apparently.
In one of the rooms the tv turns on and plays the footage of Mina and Charlie having sex the night before.
Walking back to the house a man appears behind the group but hides when Michelle drives past in the car. Charlie calls out to Michelle and chases after the car asking what she’s doing. She pulls over and tells Charlie about the video.
Charlie apologizes but asks where she found the footage which is totally the wrong thing to say. Michelle angrily drives off stranding the rest of the group at the house. Charlie doesn’t reveal to Josh or Mina why Michelle left but tells them to stick to the plan.
While driving, one of Michelle’s tires pop leading her to crash into a tree. She goes out to investigate and finds that someone has placed a spike strip on the ground.
Michelle runs back to the car and attempts to text Charlie but someone runs at the car before we cut back to the group at the house. There Charlie receives texts from Michelle (definitely not her) telling him of the crash.
He rushes out into the woods and finds the car but Michelle missing. Calling her phone he sees, who he thinks is Michelle, holding the phone a few feet away but when he gets closer he sees Michelle’s dead body on the ground. The person holding Michelle’s phone attacks Charlie striking him several times in the head, killing him.
Back at the house Josh and Mina attempt to get into the hidden room they found earlier. With no success Josh eventually resorts to brute forcing his way in by kicking the doorknob off which works.
Inside they don’t find anything remotely related to the cameras, instead finding boxes of old crap begging the question, why was this room locked?
Josh continues searching the room while Mina heads inside to look elsewhere. Josh then gets a voice message from Charlie’s phone revealed to be a recording of the conversation Mina and Charlie had earlier that day.
Josh confronts Mina about what they were talking about but she doesn’t tell him. He then gets the video of the two having sex sent to him just as the front door opens. Believing it’s Charlie who entered the house, an extremely pissed off Josh goes off to look for him.
Opening one of the closest, Josh is attacked by a man in an old man mask.
The masked man hits Josh over the head with a hammer knocking him to the ground. Mina hears the commotion and runs downstairs only to see the killer and runs back up. The killer gives chase but Josh grabs his foot and the killer earns his title by killing Josh with the hammer.
Upstairs the killer checks the balcony and sees Mina’s shoe downstairs. Believing she escaped through the window, he heads downstairs. It’s then revealed Mina was still in the room and the killer fell for the oldest trick in the book.
Mina grabs something from her purse and runs out of the house. The killer appears and grabs her but she stabs him in the face with whatever the thing was she grabbed out of her purse, keys? Nail filer? Screwdriver? It looked like a thin screwdriver or pen? I don’t know but it’s really bothering me that I can’t see what it is.
Email me at AverageMovieGoerReviews@gmail.com if you can tell what the hell it is.
Anyway in the struggle the killer throws Mina down the stairs and she injures her ankle. She’s able to escape and run off into the foggy woods. As he gives chase Mina continues running through the fog and abruptly falls off of the cliff to her death.
The killer cleans up the bodies of everyone else, removes all the cameras from the house, removes the receivers, and takes off his mask though we, the audience, don’t see his face.
We then see Reggie enter the house having found his way back. The killer pets Reggie and leaves.
We then see a montage of the killer arriving at a new house, setting up cameras, and preparing another murder. As the credits roll we see camera footage of a new group in the home before the killer attacks them and we cut to black.
Review:
This is one of those movies that really tries to get you to care about the characters before they start getting murdered one by one. Honestly it’s pretty understandable since there are only five characters in the entire movie (not counting the killer or Reggie The Dog) and a main plot point is infidelity, so a lot of time is spent building the character relationships.
Mainly due to the acting, it actually works and the first half of the movie really feels like it could divert to being a rom-com or a character study on relationships.
This wouldn’t be my first recommendation to someone looking for a horror movie to watch but I would recommend it to someone looking for a movie to watch. The first death of the movie doesn’t even happen until almost an hour into this hour and half movie.
The acting is well-done and the character motivations feel real, besides one or two actions that don’t really fit. For example Michelle’s anger toward Charlie possibly having cheated on his ex didn’t really fit her understanding nature. In fact that scene could have been cut and nothing would have really changed.
Overall it’s a good movie and an okay horror movie and that’s not a bad thing.
Should I have a rating system or something?
Cast IMDB