For all of its experimentation, there is one universal truth about thehorror genre: it loves a good killer. From mask-wearing monsters to devilish charmers, this medium is filled with murderers who offer a distinct approach to their bloodshed, scaring watchers while leaving them wanting more. The hunt for the “next big villain” has led to countless antagonists with a unique flair – which is what makesWhat Keeps You Alive’sso unsettling. Directed byColin Minihan, thisLGBTQ+film is a haunting portrayal of the worst wedding anniversary ever, introducing a kind of antagonist audiences have never encountered before. One who subverts all expectations by being something that so few of the “evil geniuses” that fill this genre are: calm.
In a meta filled with killers who claim to be cold and ruthless, never before have viewers seen such a grounded lethality, one that not onlymakes her actions uncomfortable to watch but also creepily realistic. The theme of “you can’t trust anybody” is well-trodden territory, but presenting a person who couldn’t care less about enacting gruesome murders and is simply content to do what it takes to achieve her ultimate goal creates a characterwho those watching could genuinely see coexisting among them.Through her, the film emphasizes how easy it is for people to lie, how wholly your life can be rocked by someone you love deciding to hurt you in unimaginable ways – and, if they’re anything like this woman, how they’ll feel absolutely nothing while they do it.
What Keeps You Alive
Majestic mountains, a still lake and venomous betrayals engulf a married couple attempting to celebrate their one-year anniversary.
‘What Keeps You Alive’ Delivers Love Before The Horror
It’s hard for a movie to resonate with an audience, yet the beginning ofWhat Keeps You Alivehas watchers experiencing a feeling they may not have expected from a Horror movie: love. The film focuses on Jules (Brittany Allen) and Jackie (Hannah Emily Anderson), a couple who decide to celebrate their first wedding anniversary at Jackie’s childhood cabin in the woods. The pair’s affection for one another is clear from the start; whether it be the small moments of Jules admiring her wife or Jackie knowing exactly how to make her smile, the film presents their relationship practically, showcasingthe subtle yet impactful ways that love expresses itself in partnerships. Their anniversary turns out to be an eventful one, as a run-in with Jackie’s old friend Sarah (Martha MacIsaac) reveals not only that Jackie changed her name from Megan, but also that she’d been guilt-ridden for decades over the accidental death of their childhood friend in the local lake. Jules comforts Jackie, this moment of nurturing paired well with the scenes of them cuddling and kissing show just how deeply this couple feels for one another. All of this creates an authentic depiction of affection that wouldn’t be out of place in a romantic comedy – making it that much more shocking when Jackie pushes Jules off a cliff.
This Psychological Horror Movie Masterfully Crafts a Creepy, Slow-Burn Terror Experience
Just how far would you go for the “perfect” body?
This moment changes the movie as a whole, as the entire plot shifts from spotlighting some cute romance into a jaw-dropping examination of one of cinema’s most disturbing minds. Horror is filled with a wide range of killers, from silent beasts like Jason Voorhees to the terrifyingly commonplace main character inHenry: Portrait of a Serial Killer, yet no matter how they try to present, each villain has some novel hook that stylizes their killings while driving them to commit more. Yet no matter how “grounded” a movie tries to present its central evil, in trying to grant them some interesting aspect, the film distances them frombeing a realistic terror that audiences can actually see existing in their lives.These quirks create a safety barrier for viewers, one that distances them from the flagrant thirst for the blood of these fantastical characters and assures those watching that they could never exist in real life. It’s what makes Jackie so unnerving, as watchers quickly learn that she takes no joy in her killings (aside from satisfaction at finishing a task), that she isn’t trying to put on a show or satiate some innate thirst for death – like so many of us everyday, she just wants to get her work done.
‘What Keeps You Alive’ Is Definitely the Worst Way to Spend an Anniversary
Jules luckily survives her initial shove from a cliff and, in good company with a baffled audience, the rest ofWhat Keeps You Alivesees her come to understand how much of a monster the woman she’d fallen in love with is. She learns that Jackie is a serial killer andhas a long list of previous wives who suffered “accidents"and whose deaths granted her large sums of insurance money – a list that Jules was meant to join. The film offers a few moments of the bloody violence that fills this genre, with moments like Jules' initial shove and the way that Jackie mercilessly slaughters Sarah and her husband for suspecting her secret, revealing just how far the woman is willing to go to get what she wants. Yet it isn’t this violence that makes Jackie terrifying, but rather the chilling lack of care she exhibits around each blood-soaked moment. Jackie ruins lives, she kills people and traumatizes the person who committed her whole self to her, and the entire time this is going on,Jackie just seems bored.
There were so many tropes that Jackie could have fallen into; horror is filled with malicious spouses desperate to enact some perceived vengeance against their partner, or “unfeeling” killers whose detachment from the world around them is supposed to set them apart from the bombastic murderers of the past (who still have the same nonstop want for death). But Jackie refuses to fall into a stereotype because she takes no joy in killing, she is simply checking boxes off of her to-do list, only becoming genuinely aggravated when anyone daresto interfere with her carefully laid out plans. Her complete lack of emotion is seen many times throughout the film, but there’s one haunting moment where Jackie, drenched in the viscera of her latest victim, forces Jules to check her pulse to show her former partner something truly scary: how even her pulse is. Whether it be butchering others or falsifying an entire relationship, Jackie feels absolutely nothing, yet she has enough of an understanding of the world she considers idiotic and emotional to blend in perfectly within it. Jackie may be the first truly calculated and detached Horror antagonist, creating killer whose actions are almost as terrifying as her cold efficiency.
‘What Keeps You Alive’? Definitely Not Her
WhileWhat Keeps You Alivedefinitely creates a subversive new Horror antagonist, it isn’t the first film to try and portray an unfeeling killer. In fact, this is a subgenre unto itself, as there are many films whose murderers are scary primarilybecause of how little they care about the lives they end. These are haunting, yes, but there has rarely – if ever – been a cold killer as terrifyingly analytical as Jackie. Her callousness speaks to an overwhelming lack of care for anything but her own interests, Jackie finds no glee in committing horrific acts and only sees each one as a frustrating new task she’ll have to handle to get what she wants. She shirks the theatrics that often fill this medium and the plot hooks that push other “unfeeling” monsters to continue their killing sprees, presenting someone whose realistic approach to achieving her disgusting goals emphasizes the movie’s central theme that you truly never know what is going on inside the head of those around you. She is a clear example of just how terrifying it can be to encounter someone who cares for absolutely nothing in this world and is willing to kill for their own gain – and shows just how close that someone may be to you right now.
What Keeps You Aliveis currently available to stream on AMC+ in the U.S.
