Death of a Unicorn gallops around without a point
Undoubtedly, a lot of time and effort went into making Death of a Unicorn. There’s also little doubt that the filmmakers knew that with their film’s plot, and especially its title, their futile goal was to launch their film into immediate “cult classic” status. Everyone knows that cult films earn their “cult” status naturally and gradually. And so, unfortunately, Death of a Unicorn takes a unique premise and surrounds it with an abundance of half-baked ideas and incomplete characters. Death of a Unicorn is neither demented enough for a niche horror audience, nor entertaining enough for a mainstream audience. Perhaps the filmmakers got lost in the sauce, for what could’ve been a simple creature feature is, instead, a sloppily assembled, undisguised commentary on wealth, with a heavy-handed father-daughter subplot sprinkled in, because, why not?
Elliot (Paul Rudd) and Ridley (Jenna Ortega) play a father and daughter on a road trip to the woodland estate owned by Elliot’s boss, an extremely wealthy but terminally ill pharmaceutical company CEO, Odell Leopold (Richard E. Grant). Also residing at the estate are Odell’s wife, Belinda (Téa Leoni), his son, Shepard (Will Poulter), butler Griff (Anthony Carrigan), and a host of servants and on-call scientists and military personnel. The latter bunch of on-call characters aren’t introduced, or even suggested, until Elliot and Ridley show the family a unicorn they hit and killed on the way in. When the Leopolds realize the deceased creature’s unlimited healing powers, their estate turns into a military arsenal/science lab in a moment’s notice. Of course, more unicorns are in the forest, and they seek violent revenge.
The Leopold family is overly eccentric, with Richard E. Grant’s outrageously verbose and philosophizing character specifically out of place. Leoni and Poulter’s characters are amusingly stubborn and quirky, but feel more grounded than the others. Elliot and Ridley are poorly written characters, staying entirely one-dimensional throughout the film while reacting semi-unphased at first and then with much-belated emotion to the chaos erupting around them. By the time the moment arrives where Elliot and Ridley finally connect (they were both emotionally distant upon their arrival at the estate), I was completely uninterested in their story. The unicorns would be the most interesting part of the film if they didn’t look so silly. Without interesting characters or creatures to connect with, the film can only plunder around for cheap gory thrills and tiresome critiques.
Yes, the drug industry is corrupt. Yes, absurd wealth is, well, absurd. Do we need these obvious lessons shouted at us in a movie about killer unicorns? No, we do not. Death of a Unicorn wastes a great cast and a silly (but promising) premise in an overstuffed film. Despite the preposterous setup, Death of a Unicorn could have been an exciting horror film. When you have unicorns at the center of a modern-day setting, further fantastical or ridiculous elements aren’t necessary.
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Death of a Unicorn opens in theaters Friday, March 28th.
