Until Dawn Review: No Choices, No Tension, No Survival

by Tom April 25, 2025

“Until Dawn”, a film adaptation of the renowned horror video game, disappointingly misses the mark. Despite a promising premise that resembles a mix of “Scream” and “Groundhog Day”, the film underperforms due to lackluster execution. The clever plot, involving multiple life-or-death choices by the characters trapped on a snowy mountain with a slasher, fails to translate well from game to screen. Regrettably, the bulk of the film’s potential is left unrealised, leading to a frustrating viewing experience that makes one yearn for the far superior video game instead.

Until Dawn Review: No Choices, No Tension, No Survival

– “Until Dawn” is a movie adaptation of a 2015 Sony video game, where the main character choices impact the fate of characters on a snowy mountain being hunted by a killer. The film plot is about five friends who get hunted by a deformed clown in a stuck-in-time home and repeatedly die, restarting at the last checkpoint each time they do.
– The film was suggested to change its horror film style with each reset, but this idea did not materialize in the final production, resulting in a linear, repetitive narrative. The promising potential was not utilized, resulting in a lackluster plot with underdeveloped characters and decaying horror elements which failed to hold audience interest.
– The cinematography is flat and under-lit, the dialogue is mainly fear and trauma-based, and the script introduces irrelevant historical context at the end, which leaves the viewer uninterested. These shortcomings made the reviewer prefer the original video game over the film.

The film “Until Dawn” blends elements of “Scream” and “Groundhog Day,” presenting an intriguing concept tainted by lackluster execution, which is very frustrating considering its potential. Sony introduced this concept in 2015 with a horror-survival video game, co-written by Larry Fessenden, with actors Rami Malek, Hayden Panetierre, and Peter Stormare lending their voices. The remastered PS5 game puts the players in control, allowing them to make choices that affect the lives of the characters on a snowy mountain pursued by a killer. It’s this unique player-driven engagement that Sony aimed to replicate in the film adaptation of “Until Dawn.”

The plot follows Clover (Ella Rubin) leading her group of friends on a quest to find her disappeared sister Melanie (Maia Mitchell). Accompanying her are ex-boyfriend Max (Michael Cimino), friend Nina (Odessa A’zion), Nina’s boyfriend Abel (Belmont Cameli), and psychically endowed Megan (Ji-young Yoo). These friends venture into a valley, which is seemingly frozen in the past, with a 17-year-old calendar, a repetitively used guest book, and a giant hourglass as clues to an impending madness.

With a deformed clown chasing them relentlessly, the friends find themselves stuck in a terrifying cycle. Just like a video game, they respawn at the same point each time they die, introducing a unique twist to this horror film and resembling “Edge of Tomorrow” in its implementation. The concept originally hinted at the film taking on varied horror styles with each hourglass spin, but disappointingly, it remains consistently similar throughout, reducing to a prolonged, monotonous version of “The Descent,” with creatures creating jump scares.

Despite a few exciting sequences where the characters face exotic threats (like water causing explosive reactions), the film falls short in its cinematography, with under-lit and dull scenes. The script doesn’t offer much depth to the characters, who largely oscillate between fear and trauma, resulting in an increasingly repetitive movie bogged down by frantic editing, overdone sound design, and forgettable characters. The late introduction of the town’s history and the fate of its original residents comes across as an afterthought and fails to engage the viewer.

Overall, “Until Dawn” lacks the spark and depth of its video game counterpart, reducing a potentially exciting concept to a repetitive and tedious viewing experience. The film’s idea of translating a player’s video game experience into a movie doesn’t quite materialize effectively, resulting in a missed opportunity.