Tuesday, September 19, 2023

Killer Book Club (2023)

Eight friends who have a book club decide to teach their English professor a lesson after he tries to assault Angela in his office, even after she rebuffs his advances.  He threatens to destroy her future career as a writer if she tells anyone. The group figures he’s probably done this to other women and want pay back.

After Angels says she’s changed her mind and sets up a time to meet with the professor after hours, the group dresses as clowns and arm themselves with pickaxes.  Deadly weapons don’t seem like a good idea for pranks, but I guess it’s one way to ensure he’s scared. 

When the professor accidentally falls over the railing and is killed, the group swears to keep their involvement quiet and the death is deemed an accidental fall. However the next day, they all receive a text that someone named Mad Clown has joined their book club as an administrator. He releases the first chapter of his book, which is about eight friends who kill a professor while doing a prank.

The book states the participants deserve to die and each chapter will detail a members death. Angela starts seeing clowns around campus. The group also starts suspecting each other because who else would know what they did. Then Koldo, the club member who’s an influencer with a vlog about books, live streams about the Mad Clown chapters. So even though he’s on the death list, he’s asking people to read the chapters and help choose the next victim. Koldo isn’t very bright.

The movie is okay. I probably give foreign movies more leeway than US movies. Maybe because subtitles require more concentration.  What drove me nuts about this film is the group talks a lot about what they did while in public.  If you agreed to hide you were part of a prank that killed a professor, would you talk about what happened in the college library? Or in the class that your dead professor taught?  And look at the messages from the Mad Clown on your phone in the dark during class? Way to make sure anyone else sitting near you can see them.

Also if you’re doing a prank, why do you have pickaxes?  Sure it’s going to inspire fear, but you could also accidentally injure someone. Or the victim could grab the weapon and attack you.  I’m still not sure how the professor managed to go over the railing.  The way it was shot it wasn’t clear. 

Lastly the professor mentioned he got an email from Angela.  She says she thought she didn’t hit send on the email.  I know she’s traumatized after his attempted assault, but she never picks up on that discrepancy. She says she sent two chapters of a book and he has no idea what she’s talking about. So obviously something weird is going on.

Also I’m not sure if the killer was obvious to anyone watching or just I’ve seen so many horror movies I can pick out the patterns.

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