Night of Wrath Review

Night of Wrath review

A lesson in honesty…and only slightly more exciting.

New movie reviews will not contain spoilers.

Night of Wrath

Directed by Robbie Bagley

Written by Jon Cooper

Starring Anson Bagley, Mia Bagley, Camrey Bagley Fox, Logan Squire, Jennica Anusua, Weston Wright and Gabrielle Jane

Night of Wrath Review

I took a lot of notes during Night of Wrath. More than usual. Upon looking back at them for this review I couldn’t help but wonder why I had done that. Our non-spoiler reviews try to avoid specific moments as much as is possible. Night of Wrath is built out of specific moments. It has a large cast and each character harbors a secret. There are several trails for the group to endure…each leading to a conclusion of someone’s individual story. There’s even a bit of a mystery to solve about who has set this whole ordeal up in the first place. Despite having an extensive list of notes to draw upon…I can’t help but think this review doesn’t need any of them. We’ll get into why that is after the usual second paragraph plot summary.

A group of teens, all members of the virtuous student society, find themselves trapped in a haunted house attraction forced to complete trials or reveal their darkest secret to escape. While they play through the twisted game, Jane (Mia Bagley) investigates from the outside. Hoping to uncover who is behind everything.

Night of Wrath is, mostly, a low-stakes affair. The punishment for failure isn’t death…it’s having your secret exposed to the world. The story does come up with a long list of secrets that someone would want to hide…either for legal or personal reasons. But we don’t know most of these characters well enough for the revelation that they aren’t what they seem to be to register at any level of importance. The result to most viewers is more of a gossip game than anything. For younger viewers, as I suspect was the intention, Night of Wrath might play out like a pseudo-slasher parable.

Morality is the major theme in Night of Wrath. It pushes the lesson that dishonesty has consequences and lies will come back to haunt you. It’s certainly the most interesting lens with which to view Night of Wrath through. The truth is that hardcore horror fans won’t find much here for them. They’ll recognize the setup and find the punchlines too watered down. Tweens may see it differently. While it’s rarely accompanied by any sense of danger…there is certainly an age group that would be frightened by having their most intimate secrets on display for the world to see.

Despite the training wheels attached to the ride…Night of Wrath does manage to drop a body or two. There isn’t a lot of suspense involved in those moments…but their existence at least introduces the possibility of stakes beyond finding out you cheated on a test or a girlfriend. It also moves Night of Wrath firmly into the “gateway horror” column. A movie made to appeal to younger viewers who either aren’t familiar enough with the genre to see through the story…or who are only brave enough to dip a toe in the water. It certainly never goes as hard as the wildly out of place meat slicer scene in the otherwise tween aimed Fear Street 1994…but death isn’t completely off the table.

The truth is that Night of Wrath plays out more like a religious lesson on morality than a slasher movie. Sure, there’s a masked person behind the scenes…but their goal involves teaching lessons on virtuousness and honesty. You’re really going to want to be struggling with understanding those concepts before signing up for what Night of Wrath has to say. As I figured out the right and wrong of those concepts more than a couple of decades ago…the story wasn’t exactly aimed at me.

That being said, it is obvious that Night of Wrath comes from a good place. The intentions are, unironically, virtuous. An attempt to put a morality tale into something that will appeal to younger viewers interested in something a little darker. I can respect where it came from while also admitting that I have no idea if this will work for them at all.

Scare Value

Maybe Night of Wrath will work for your kids. Especially if you haven’t talked to them about right and wrong. For everyone else…Night of Wrath plays things too safe to be exciting and too preachy to be entertaining. The cast is fine. It comes from a good place. That’s all I got. Well…that and a pile of notes I didn’t use.

2/5