Sam Raimi has such an interesting body of work. The guy was at the helm of one of the most celebrated horror franchises (Evil Dead) and also some of the most beloved Marvel films (the Tobey Maguire Spiderman films). Additionally, he's directed an excellent psychological thriller (A Simple Plan), a family-friendly sports film (For Love of the Game), and a Western (The Quick and the Dead). The man has range.
But when I hear the name "Sam Raimi", I think "gross-out horror". And after a break from horror for over a decade, he's back with Send Help, a survival/horror/comedy starring Rachel McAdams and Dylan O'Brien. And yes, this movie has the Raimi Special: gross things going into people's mouths (if you've seen Drag Me to Hell, you know what I'm talking about).
McAdams plays the awkward, socially inept Linda Liddle, a corporate strategist at a large...business (what they do is unclear, since that's not the point of the movie). She has been promised a promotion to VP by the previous CEO who passed away, leaving the company to his son, Bradley (Dylan O'Brien). O'Brien plays a corporate asshole bro so beautifully. He immediately gives Linda's promotion to his frat brother and when Linda comes to his office upset, he tells her 1) that she don't got it and 2) she smells bad. However, he begrudgingly allows her to come on a corporate trip to Bangkok since the fact is the company can't survive without her ability to number-crunch.
Well, the plan crashes into the ocean on the way to Bangkok and Linda and Bradley are the only two survivors. The film establishes early on that Linda loves Survivor and even sent in an audition tape. She has read numerous books on bushcraft, knots, hunting, etc. We all know where this is going.
Send Help borrows (steals?) heavily from many, many other films: Cast Away, Triangle of Sadness, Swept Away...and even the show Yellowjackets (Misty Quigley and Linda Liddle are two of a kind--right down to the fact that they both have pet birds). The film is not original and hits many familiar beats. That said, it's still fun as hell.
There's a lot of unrealistic stuff that happens, but perhaps the most unrealistic is how Bradley continues to be an arrogant asshole in the face of his own weakness. He ends up with a severe wound from the crash and Linda saves his life. What's the first thing he does when he comes to? Starts bossing Linda around, that's what. I can buy that Bradley is an entitled jerk, but it was hard to buy that he was that much of an idiot. Shouldn't a guy running a multi-million dollar corporation be better able to read the room and his own position within it?
In any case, he attempts to establish dominance and Linda just...leaves him lying there until he is nearly dying of thirst and sunburn. Then she returns and he begs for help. It's so nice when pretty men beg, isn't it? We get a decent amount of that in this film.
But alas, Bradley must learn the lesson that help isn't coming and Linda is far and away his superior on this island over and over and over. But at the same time, the audience gets to see that Linda is not the benevolent beach goddess she presents herself as...she has a much darker side, and if Bradley gets on the wrong end of it, he's going to regret it.
Even though there weren't a ton of surprises in Send Help (although there was one that definitely got me), there is enough tension in the film about who is more dangerous--Linda or Bradley--that it kept me guessing and intrigued. We find out that Bradley and Linda are both very good liars and the power dynamics keep shifting. Even though Bradley begins their island adventure in a very weak position, as his injury heals and he learns survival tactics from Linda, he is able to take some power back...which Linda doesn't like very much.
Rachel McAdams is absolutely the star of the show here. She is hilarious and unhinged. I keep forgetting how much I love her as an actress until I see a movie like Red Eye or Game Night and remember that she is much, much more than Regina George (though she's excellent in that role as well). The woman, like Raimi, has incredible range.
As for O'Brien...man, I am glad I saw him in Twinless before this movie because he is so sensitive and vulnerable in the former film. He's so good at playing an asshole in Send Help that if I had only seen him in this movie, I might have just written him off as only good at playing bullies. But having seen him in Twinless, I can say that he, too, has incredible range...and I'll be keeping an eye out for him in future films.
Overall, Send Help is a very fun and satisfying popcorn thriller. It's pretty gross as is, but it definitely could have been nastier. I think Raimi pulled some punches to make the film more palatable to the average movie-goer, but I would have liked the film to be darker, funnier, and more sadistic. But that's just me (I liked fucked up movies, if you didn't already know).
Grade: B+
