THE RESORT: Slow Burn Vacation Horror Takes Too Long to Get Gory

The Resort, written and directed by Taylor Chien, follows a group of four friends traveling to Hawaii with hopes to make it to an abandoned resort on the island of Kilahuna. Lex (Bianca Haase) is a writer working on a book about the hauntings of this resort, and her friends Chris (Brock O’Hurn), Bree (Michelle Randolph), and Sam (Michael Vlamis) organize a trip to the island, so she can visit the resort for her research.

Pacing and Structure

The Resort sets itself up well with a short scene giving us a glimpse into the horror of this closed resort, but quickly this momentum is lost. The film also structures itself around Lex telling a detective (Dave Sheridan) about the incidents that happened during her trip to Hawaii. This cuts away some of the tension that could come from their journeys through the island and the resort. We already know who survives and who doesn’t from the first moment of these flashforwards, which come before they have even left for Hawaii.

The Resort manages to feel long at a runtime that is just around 70 minutes because of its pacing. All the time spent with the friends exploring the island before they make it to the titular resort has left out all the hints at something sinister under the surface. At one point, she says, “the island was trying to tell us to leave” in a flashforward segment, yet the scenes we have seen up to that point have not suggested anything outside a regular vacation where you don’t read a map right, but end up swimming in the alcove you were supposed to.

The Resort picks up a little bit once they arrive at the dilapidated resort, but even that takes a little more time than it should and the runtime is already getting closer to the end than you would expect.

Fun Gore, But Short-lived

Near the end of the film, The Resort finally brings in some gore, but it is too little too late. The practical makeup effects give this last part of the film a nice tone, painted with strokes of neon pink and purple. I liked this final burst of bright colors, but this is not well-done enough or used through enough of the film to make a lasting impression.

There are a few moments of gore through this finale, but having everything interesting and the least bit horror-related kept for the finale does not work, especially when such a high percentage of the runtime is spent walking through the trees and having expositional conversations about the reasons they do or do not believe in ghosts.

During these scenes following the group on their hike, the moment I found the most interesting involved two characters taking pictures a little behind their friends while their other two friends have a more serious conversation. This one moment felt realistic to how groups of people have different unconnected conversations that might seem dissonant when seen within the same frame.

The final moments of the film do work, but having to get through a slow-paced film that fills its dialogue with exposition makes those few moments not worth it.

Earlier in the film, the story of the spirit which haunts the resort, the half-faced girl, is told through the medium of someone else’s Youtube video. This should feel clunky and weird, but it was one of the moments I enjoyed watching the most. The aged and yellowed appearance of the footage used in this segment to make it feel like footage from when the resort first shut down works well and feels like a natural and visually interesting way to share this information.

The actual information represented through the footage felt generic and not necessary, but the style represented here would have been welcome throughout the film and might have been able to impart a little tension through their seemingly ordinary vacation.

Conclusion

The Resort takes too long to get to its gore, and if you are not in the mood for watching characters walk through the woods and make jokes that never land, the journey to the practical effects is not worth it. When the horror is center-stage, The Resort finds its footing, but this happens too late, especially for a film as short as this one.

What are your favorite films in the vacation horror subgenre? Share your thoughts in the comments. 

The Resort releases on digital and on-demand April 30th. It will be available through Sky Store, Virgin, iTunes, Amazon, Microsoft Store, Google Play, and Chili.

Watch The Resort