Spoilers are going to skip the trip to the remote mountain hideout.

Meta horror is not new, but it is expanding into previously unexplored territory. Exploring the tropes that we’re so familiar about slash horror films, we’ve got a feature that shows it all from the point of view of the actual unstoppable undead killer. This is a subversion that definitely takes away from the regular horror mindset into the eerie role of the over-the-shoulder companion of the antagonist.

(Credit: IFC Films)

In a Violent Nature (2024) is written and directed by Chris Nash. When a group of teenagers vacation in a remote place in the woods, they run into a collapsed fire tower where they find a locket, which one of them decides to take. This causes the awakening of Johnny (Ry Barrett) a living corpse with a history of vengeance, whose fate is tied to the locket. Now Johnny walks again… and the audience gets to walk along with him as the slashes and disembowels everyone standing in his way.

The first concept we have to get used to here is the removal of tension of uncertainty. We’re walking with the killer, and as we follow along any alienation to him dissolves. Johnny is our POV character, our silent and stoic protagonist. The teenage victims are somehow transformed into our enemies. We know where the killer is at all times, and the way that Johnny just casually strolls around behind his prey without being noticed is almost embarrassing. The horror element gets diluted without the tension. Although this is done in the name of of the concept, the film retains the amounts of gore and bloodshed of the genre. At the same time it has long periods of time where nothing of consequence seems to be happening that could have been left out. I understand they’re meant to instill a certain sense of foreboding, specially at the end, but I still feel some editing would have been good.

Recommended for horror aficionados who don’t mind exploring the genre from a different angle. It’s different that your regular horror film. It’s a meta behind-the-scenes look that will be hard to get used to for your casual horror fan. It certainly has some scenes that feel slow and drag down the runtime. However, it’s a rather rare sight to find a film like this, so I am glad for the experience. Very much worth a watch but it won’t be everyone’s cup of tea.

That will do for now.