[Film Review] Gatlopp: Hell of a Game (2022)

Warning: Review contains very minor spoilers for the film and the ending. Most of what is discussed is in the trailer.

I am a huge fan of horror comedies. When I’m feeling down, I stick on the woodchipper scene from Tucker & Dale vs. Evil, as it’s guaranteed to make me smile every time. So when I had the opportunity to review Gatlopp: Hell of a Game (2022), described as “Jumanji meets Escape Room”, I jumped at the chance. 

Following four friends reunited for an evening of drinking and board games after a decade apart, this horror(ish) comedy was not at all what I expected... 

The premise starts off strong; thirty-something Paul (played by Jim Mahoney, who also wrote the film) is going through a brutal divorce and is persuaded to temporarily stay with Cliff (Jon Bass), an old friend who still works at the same bar and lives in the same house as he did in their twenties. Cliff thinks this would be the perfect time to reunite old friends, and invites Sam (Emmy Raver-Lampman), a big-time LA producer, and Troy (Sarunas J. Jackson), a struggling actor. Together, the group reminisce about old times, eventually forgoing awkwardness built up by absence and deciding to spend the evening playing a drinking-based board game discovered by Cliff in his new credenza. What the group soon realise is this isn’t any ordinary game, Gatlopp promises players an eternity in Hell unless they can win before the sun rises. The problem is, this game is about telling the truth, and it appears that the friends have more secrets than they first realised…

From here, the narrative falls a little flat, the main problem is that this movie doesn’t seem to know exactly what it is. I was expecting laughter filled terror, maybe an escape room combined with gory injuries caused by the consequences; what I got was minor slapstick silliness with sticky hands, a single arrow through a leg, and a random jazzercize dance break that left me feeling like I’d sat on my remote and accidentally changed the channel.

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The cast play their parts well; they all seem a little tired of eachother under the surface, either due to excellent character layers and development or perhaps from the fact this production was filmed in the pandemic -- with actors and crew living in bubbles and most likely growing tired of eachother.

Emmy Raver-Lampman brings her charm and honesty to the character of Sam; the only one that doesn’t mess up the direct lives of her friends, however destroys her own due to guilt regarding her mother. Jon Bass provides easy comic relief as Cliff, making me chortle with the dribble that comes out of his mouth and his demands for tequila after he gets shot. Jim Mahoney as Paul is the main driver of the story, his response to being sent to Hell is pretty much the highlight of his storyline. Finally, Sarunas J. Jackson as Troy isn’t given much of a chance to be anything other than slightly problematic in his behaviour. The story itself is perhaps why this film feels a little off, not the casting of the individuals within it. 

The pacing however wasn’t an issue, at a solid one hour twenty minutes (including credits), and with enough weirdness to keep you paying attention (again, jazzercise, someone please explain this to me…) the film feels more like an episode of a show. Gatlopp gets in, serves you chaos and leaves you sitting through the credits wondering what on Earth just happened. 

There are some comic highlights – Paul being sent to Hell was the right choice for sure; if the rest of the film wasn’t going to lean into the potential gore and scares, it was wise to just let us see Paul’s face when he returns spooked and a little charred. The ending, although a little too happily ever after for my liking, did serve some just deserts, with the sinister game falling into the hands of a strange sex-cult party, where the man whom Paul’s wife left him for, is having a great time. 

I went into this film expecting something completely different, and felt disappointed when it didn’t provide my own selfish demands. I was hoping for more gore, something like Shaun of the Dead (2004), or maybe a film with a comic perspective familiar to horror source material like What We Do in the Shadows (2014). Although I would not recommend this film to horror fans, I would say there is an audience for this out there, perhaps someone who wants to switch on a chuckle-worthy easy watch on a Sunday evening before facing the work world the next morning.

Gatlopp: Hell of a Game is available on Digital Platforms from 27th June 2022.

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