- Directed by: Colin Minihan
- Written by: Ted Daggerhart, Daniel Meersand, Nick Simon
- Stars: Mila Harris Brittany Allen, Justin Long
- Run Time: 1 Hour, 32 Minutes
- Trailer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PmMfrJ3Gw44
Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone
This starts with something that shouldn’t be a major event but keeps building with one thing after another, part disaster and part comedy of errors. And there is lots of dark humor, along with horror and a body count. It’s an animals-attack movie pumped up with adrenaline and modern effects. We both thought it was really entertaining.
Spoilery Synopsis
A party girl walks her little dog late one night. She takes selfie after selfie as the dog does his business. A coyote eats the dog, and then she gets hit by a car. That doesn’t kill her, but the coyotes come back to finish the job. Credits roll. We hear news reports about how wildfires are pushing coyotes deeper into the Los Angeles city limits.
The pest control guy arrives outside a huge Hollywood house. Scott, the owner, says the house is brand new. But there are rats in the walls. The exterminator, Devon, is more than a little high-strung. Scott decides halfway through that maybe rats aren’t so bad, but Devon convinces him. Chloe and Liv, the rest of the family, arrive in the middle of the consultation. Chloe is a teenager, and she’s hit the annoying stage.
The doorbell rings, and it’s Julie, who’s a prostitute at the wrong house. She’s there for Trip, the next door neighbor. Liv sees that Scott is a workaholic, and she does not approve.
That night, Charlie the dog barks at the doggy door; there’s something out there. She calls Scott, who goes outside in the windstorm to check on the sound. He soon sees a really mean-looking coyote, just as the motion-sensor lights decide to go on and off. As he goes back inside, the power goes off for real. A tree has fallen on their power line– and their car.
The next morning, they assess the damage, and it’s all Scott’s fault for not trimming the tree. Liv goes next door to Trip, who has a generator and a gun; he’s a kind of prepper/survivalist. Trip’s cat may or may not have been eaten. Scott and his friend Tony work on cutting up the fallen tree, and they’re both incompetent.
On the walk home, Tony meets the coyotes, and they tear him apart. Sheila, Tony’s wife, is annoyed that he doesn’t make it home. She finds little bits of him outside, but she also finds the coyotes. This goes badly for Sheila.
Scott, Liv, and Chloe hear lots of coyotes howling in the fields nearby. They’re nearly attacked by one of them. Julie is also nearly attacked, and she interrupts Trip, who is about to shoot himself over the loss of his cat. This all leads to weird sex, but the animals sneak inside through an open door.
Scott and his family hear the gunshots from next door and wonder what’s going on. Chloe admits to feeding the coyotes earlier because they looked hungry. Scott runs to Trip’s house and finds a mess. He runs into Julie and calls Devon on the phone for help. Devon is annoyed and promises to come around in the morning to check the rat traps. Inside Trip’s house, a candle falls over and sets the place on fire.
Liv and Scott talk about their family problems– at least until they notice the house next door is on fire. Which is spreading toward their property. They all argue about what to do until they notice the animals are already inside the house. There’s a great deal of hiding and tip-toeing.
Chloe is bitten, and Scott faints at the sight of the blood. Scott goes out to the garage to build a cage they can hide in, and we get a construction montage.
Devon the exterminator arrives outside and sees the coyotes. He soon realizes that these aren’t rats, but that’s too late to save him. Inside, Scott finds two tiny coyote puppies trapped inside and figures this is why the coyotes are so fixated on the area. He finishes his “Coyote Cage” and wheels himself outside in it.
Scott offers the lead coyote the two puppies in a trade. The family is reunited in the front yard since the coyotes understand a peace treaty– no, they don’t. They attack Julie. They all climb into Devon’s van and drive away. Meanwhile, the gas-fueled house explodes excessively. Scott laments his now-lost comic book collection.
Devon wakes up and goes out fighting with the animals…
Brian’s Commentary
It’s good! It’s a fairly standard animals-gone-wild story, like from the 70s, but this one has a bunch of modern humor thrown in. It’s also got Justin Long, who seems to have been in half the horror films of the past decade.
There’s not much actually new here, but it takes elements we’ve seen before and jumbles them up nicely. The acting, sets, and creature effects are all quite good, and most importantly, it never slowed down or got boring.
It’s a winner!
Kevin’s Commentary
It’s kind of a silly film, but I thought it was very entertaining. It did remind me of some of the animals gone bad, people fighting nature films of the past, but they dialed it up to ten and a half. There’s still plenty of gore with a body count, but I laughed out loud more than once. I’d recommend it.