3 out of 5

Directed by: Adam Mason

Yeah, see, just stick to the B-movie stuff and it works out.  Don’t pretend you’re prestige, Into the Dark, by trying to tackle gender issues, or associating with notable genre names: you’re Blumhouse, home of mostly average-to-good, generic horror; you’re based around a quirk of being holiday-centric.  Just accept it.  Revel in it.

…Which April Fool’s entry, I’m Just Fucking With You, very much does.  From it’s oft-repeated catch phrase to its overly winky, ‘hip’ editing style and use of meme-ish audio clips, director Adam Mason and writers Gregg Zehentner and Scott Barkan make the absolute most of actor Hayes MacArthur as over-the-top and obnoxious prankster Chester, who straddles and dominates the very modern filmic presentation whilst gleefully tormenting guests Rachel (Jessica McNamee) and Larry (Keir O’Donnell) at the motel which he purports to run.

There’s some casual commentary on online personas – Larry is on the way to a wedding of an ex who he cruelly trolls online via a pseudonym – and their mismatch with our real lives, played off against the continual provocations of Chester, who, while hiding behind “jokes” is also sorta exactly the creepo he seems to be, and yeah, this casual commentary is swished about and then spat out for a ridiculous cut-and-run ending, but the 80 or so minutes leading up to that point are a well handled series of escalations and off-kilterness.  And Mason doesn’t cheat, which I appreciate: once we’re shown how things are going, there’s no doubling back, with MacArthur selling us on this despite the ridiculousness of the setup overall.

Not a good movie, but an absolutely enjoyable one, and of the upper-tier B entries in the Into The Dark series thus far.