3 Short Paragraphs (Or Not): Becky

2020, Jonathan Milott, Cary Murnion (Bushwick) -- Netflix

This one has been on my radar for a while, a small, violent, indie movie about a teenage girl fighting back against home invaders. Its not an innovative plot or something done with grandeur and style, but simply a director exploring a trope in their own way. And its pretty successful in just that.

Becky (Lulu Wilson, The Haunting of Hill House) is your typically surly teen, a bit more heightened by her grief for her mother and Dad's (Joel McHale, Community) seemingly quick moving-on only a year or so later. They make a trip to the family lakehouse, where she is delighted they are not selling it, but made even more angry that he has chosen this trip to forcibly connect Becky to his new girlfriend, and her son.

Meanwhile, a neo-nazi at a nearby prison has engineered his violent escape bringing him and his crew to the lakehouse. While Becky hides out in her woodsy treehouse with one of the family dogs, the criminals take control of the house. The situation is exacerbated by the fact that Dad's new GF is black; we the viewer expect the worst of a terrible situation. 

There are not great revelations in the movie, no plot twists or incredible character turn-abouts. What you have is a MacGuffin, a key, that Dominick (Kevin James, Paul Blart: Mall Cop), the neo-nazi leader, left behind in the house before Jeff, Becky's father, bought it (I guess? Its never explained.) that Becky keeps from the Bad Guys, and you have Becky's shocking propensity for violence. In all home invader movies, the Survivor has to use violence to ... survive. But the driver for this movie is how easily Becky adapts to violently, horribly, so very very angrily killing each of the mooks that work for Dominick. The movie wants you to question who is the real "monster" in the movie.

Final Girl syndrome begs you to cheer on Becky, to hoot and holler as she kills each aggressor, but I didn't feel that way. Sure, each of them deserve it, but does Becky? Not only does she lose her remaining parent, and one of the family dogs, but she also loses any hint of innocence left to her. She is not going to have a good life hereafter. Her anger will only sustain her so long. I guess that's why there had to be a sequel.

Tangent. Movies like this, horror and thrillers, often create iconic props, totems you might say. Often they are held by the monster: Jason's goalie mask, Michael's William Shatner mask, etc. But in this movie, Becky, the "heroine", wears a knitted fox cap that she pulls on in the "gearing up" scene. It became iconic enough to get a thousand Etsy stores.