Imagine a unicorn — what comes to mind? Perhaps a pure white beast of medieval legend or a shiny pink pony-like creature one might see on a child’s lunchbox. A less obvious interpretation of the typically-fantastical creature is a night-stalking, fanged, snarling beast that viciously rips apart innocent people limb from limb. “Death of a Unicorn” is a new dark comedy that reimagines the stereotypically-cuddly creature into a horror movie monster. While the film is quite funny, certainly entertaining and positively gory, its outlandish premise comes with many pitfalls that the movie fails to avoid.
The story follows Elliot Kintner (Paul Rudd) and his art major daughter, Ridley (Jenna Ortega), as they travel up to the house of Elliot’s boss, the Leopold family, located in a secluded Canadian nature preserve. Odell Leopold (Richard E. Grant), the wealthy CEO of a major pharmaceutical company, is on his deathbed, and the family, comprised of Odell, wife Belinda (Téa Leoni) and son Shepard (Will Poulter) want to get to know Elliot and his daughter before naming Elliot the arbiter of the will.
On the way, the Kintners crash into a mysterious creature that turns out to be, you guessed it, a unicorn. Fearful of leaving the creature behind, they take its body to the Leopold residence and subsequently find out that its blood and horn have the power to cure basically any malady, including Odell’s cancer. The newfound discovery leads to a frenzy as the family attempts to study, capitalize and hoard the miraculous power. However, by researching unicorn tales of old, Ridley begins to suspect that a great evil is coming for them. Ultimately, she is proven right, as nightmarish cryptids emerges from the woods to hunt, punish and kill the humans for their greed.
“Death of a Unicorn” contains many highlights. The premise itself is incredibly inventive, and the plot succeeds in capturing the excitement, dread and tension of the concept. I gasped, cringed and looked away in horror throughout, as the film truly does not pull punches with its depictions of gore, making for a satisfying movie-going experience. I also laughed out loud multiple times: the script nails the ‘comedy’ aspect of a dark comedy.
This ability to balance both horror and humor comes in large part from the cast. Ortega and Rudd provide passable performances as the daughter-father duo, serving as the emotional core for the film. Ortega brings some real heart to the role, particularly towards the end of the runtime; however, both felt stilted in certain sections.
The real star of the show was Poulter as Shepard, the obnoxiously-douchey son of the Leopold family. Poulter undoubtedly offers one of the most memorable performances, with incredible line reads and ridiculous facial expressions despite his side character status. He, along with the rest of the Leopold family, capture the ridiculous lives of the ultra-rich as they scheme their way into control despite being utterly incompetent.
“Death of a Unicorn” struggles, however, because of its ambition. If done right, ambition can be a movie’s greatest strength. In some ways, I would say the chances the film takes do pay off, as it offers a fresh take on the all-too-typical ‘rich-people-are-bad’ storyline. Still, the film as a whole could’ve been much tighter by cutting a few superfluous plotlines.
Along with the creature-feature story, the film attempts to deal with themes of grief and death, psychedelic trips through unicorn-induced connection and the horrors of the American healthcare system. This all proves to be too much and takes away from some of the movie’s staying power, as I found myself forgetting the plot even a few minutes after the credits rolled.
The film is notably weak in the latter half, as the hunt to kill the unicorns (or, more accurately, the unicorn’s hunt to kill the humans) seems to drag a little past its welcome, lost in the rest of the plotlines. At a certain point, only so many dramatic shots with shadows of the creatures projected on the wall can be shown before the visual loses its tension.
Beyond the plot, I wish Ridley and Elliot could’ve been fleshed out more, as their dynamic is meant to be the central aspect of the story. However, both are played as rather one-note — Ridley as an art student in the midst of rebellion and Elliot as a workaholic, somewhat neglectful father are somewhat played-out, tired tropes.
Overall, “Death of a Unicorn” is good — the film is a bit stupid at parts, but it maintains a solid equilibrium between the scary and the silly that allows for a fun, albeit wild, ride.
