The Cabin in the Woods

ZIP. This is the amount of will I had to watch this up until Late Thursday night when I first watched the trailer. I read a few things and saw where RT had it at a staggering 93%, then I felt more than intrigue. I will say this film combines several genre's, but Horror still wins out as the majority genre. I had heard Comedy, Thriller, Twists, and more. What I was expecting, Tucker and Dale/ SOTD, was not necessarily the case. It did have remnants of those films, along with The Truman Show (and I'm pretty sure the writers throw that reference right in our face), but it really had a very predictable ending...but I will say I was still guessing as to how it would end right up until the actual end. It really started out very surprising to me. First off, I had no idea Bradley Whitford and Richard Jenkins would play an intricate part in the comedy aspect of this film. Those two are always welcome in any film. Then we have Thor, Chris Hemsworth, in a surprising role coming off of Thor and also Huntsman. He gets to be the goofy Jock, and he does very well at it. Cabin is 2 movies. The first half is a completely different film from the second half. I think I would have liked it better than I did if it could have continued the first half theme through the credits, but I will say the u turn it takes, also is fun to watch. Bloody as all, but fun. This is proving difficult to write without spoilers, but I will do my best. When these 5 friends go on vaca to The Cabin, they expect nothing more than a quiet weekend, but then they accidentally open pandora's box. Now they must fight for their lives and figure out what is going on. To be able to watch someone's head get ripped off one minute, then laugh out laugh at a quip the next is just good writing. It does this the whole movie. Extreme violence to extreme comedy in back to back scenes. Very well done in that aspect. Cabin also is not short on tributes to other films of the genre. I saw a similarity to The Ring, and I am 99% sure the Underworld Lycan is on screen, but I must say the unicorn is my favorite part. No lie, Unicorn!! We are given the ultimate goal of the film in a descriptive speech from everyone's Hollywood Sci-Fi Queen (Not gonna Spoil it), and then the film ends. I' am not sure I agree with the RT score on this. I cannot seem to figure out why critics LOVE some films and HATE others, when essentially they are the same. I did enjoy it, and it was very well written. I will end this by saying I HATE Horror films and Slasher films, but this is not either. This was good even though it had those aspects much of the time. 
I will watch it again once on video to see if I missed any of the jokes. 
NBM rates The Cabin in the Woods - Awesome