What to watch with your family at Thanksgiving can turn into an endless debate, particularly with the seemingly infinite options that streaming services provide. So to save you time this holiday weekend, we’ve handpicked a thematically appropriate film that should bring the whole family together* no matter what: the Turkey Day-themed slasher Thanksgiving.
*“bringing the family together” can mean “getting nauseous via immaculately crafted gore”
Directed by master of gore Eli Roth, and originally based on his Grindhouse short of the same name, Thanksgiving is a holiday slasher that follows a small New England town that’s being terrorized by a murderous Thanksgiving mascot exactly one year after a Black Friday tragedy.
The whole thing is exactly as silly and ridiculous as it sounds, but it’s also a bloody good time. Each of the movie’s many, many kills gets progressively bigger, gorier, and more absurd, but the real treat with this movie is how carefully it dials in its suspense, finding the perfect line to make every moment tense without ever really being terrifying. Even more importantly, for a silly slasher of this variety, Thanksgiving has a great mix of characters that you’re rooting for and characters that feel tailor-made for you to cheer when they meet their fate. As for family appeal, it’s even got a cast that spans pop culture generations, from Grey’s Anatomy’s Patrick Dempsey to TikTok’s Addison Rae. This delicate balance makes it a secretly perfect watch with a group that enjoys horror movies but may have different levels of tolerance for the actual scares those movies contain… as long as everyone is down for some particularly gnarly and graphic kills.
Of course, that does bring up the biggest caveat to this recommendation: whether or not the idea of watching a particularly gory horror movie together on Thanksgiving is your family’s idea of a good time or not. As for my family, a good silly slasher that’s equal parts fun and bloody is always a perfect way to spend some time together. If that sounds like something you can relate to, then this one is perfect for your happy Thanksgiving.
Thanksgiving is streaming on Netflix.
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