Happy Death Day is a 2017 American horror comedy film. The film’s plot is about a college student named Tree who keeps reliving her birthday over and over again.
The movie is so popular because of the twist ending, which most people find to be really unexpected and clever. It also has some really great acting, especially from Jessica Rothe who plays the lead role of Tree.
Jason Blum’s Blumhouse Productions, in collaboration with Digital Riot Media and Vesuvius Productions, produced the picture.
It follows a college girl who is murdered on her birthday night and continues reliving the day over and over again, prompting her to seek out the killer and put an end to her death.
Universal Pictures released the picture on October 13, 2017, under the title Half to Death, which was first announced in 2007.
It earned $125 million worldwide on a $4.8 million budget,with critics hailing the picture as enjoyable and praising Rothe’s acting while noting the familiar premiseand describing it as “Groundhog Day meets Scream.” On February 13, 2019, a sequel, Happy Death Day , was released.
Happy_Death_Day_2U
happy death day
Plot
Theresa “Tree” Gelbman, a university student, wakes up in the dorm room of classmate Carter Davis on her birthday after a night of wild partying. She dismisses Carter and returns to her room, ignoring a phone call from her father. Lori Spengler, a sorority housemate, gives her a cupcake, which she promptly discards. Tree meets with Gregory Butler, a married professor with whom she is having an affair. Tree is lured into a tunnel and murdered by a figure dressed as the school mascot on her way to a party that night.
Tree wakes up in Carter’s bed and is startled to discover the events of the previous day repeating itself. She relives the day, this time bypassing the tunnel and arriving at the party, perplexed.
The masked killer, however, pursues her and murders her once more. Tree wakes up in Carter’s bed for the second time, understands she’s stuck in a time loop, and locks herself in her room to avoid death. The killer, who is already inside, murders her for the third time.
Tree awakens in Carter’s bed, startled to find the events of the day before repeating itself. She relives the day, avoiding the tunnel this time and arriving to the party puzzled.
The masked killer, on the other hand, pursues her and murders her again. Tree awakens for the second time in Carter’s bed, realizes she’s trapped in a time loop, and locks herself in her room to avoid death. For the third time, the killer, who is already inside, murders her.
Tree persuades Carter of her predicament by exhibiting her knowledge of the day’s events in his bed. Tree admits to having a lot of self-hatred, especially when her mother died three years ago and she pushed her father away. Tree views a local news story about serial killer John Tombs, who is being held at the university hospital.
Tree comes to the hospital after concluding that Tombs is her assailant and warns him of his impending release. Tombs escapes and nearly kills Tree, but Carter chases him down and saves her.
Tombs assassinates Carter before chasing Tree to a neighboring bell tower, where she uses a crowbar to subdue him. Before striking a deadly blow, she understands that if she kills Tombs and ends the loop, Carter will be dead for the rest of his life.
Tree is still stuck in the loop when she wakes up. She returns to her room, terrified, with the intention of fleeing, where Lori offers her the cupcake once more.
Tree discovers that the preceding loop was the only time she had ever eaten the cupcake, and that she had passed away while sleeping.
Lori is Tree’s genuine killer, she realizes. Lori poisoned the cupcake, but when Tree refused to eat it, she used her employment as a hospital nurse to frame Tombs for Tree’s death.
Lori confronts Tree as she threatens to take the cupcake to the cops. Lori also admits to having an affair with Dr. Butler, who enraged Lori with his preference for Tree. Tree stuffs the poisoned cupcake into her mouth during the ensuing scuffle.
Production
Pre-production
The picture, formerly named Half to Death, was announced in June 2007 as a collaboration between Michael Bay and Rogue Pictures, with Antti Jokinen directing. The screenplay by Scott Lobdell was rewritten by Christopher Landon. ”
Landon stated,” “At the time, the film was in pre-production or soft production, and I came on board because I liked the premise. The idea of a girl imprisoned in a time loop who must investigate her own murder appealed to me.”
Only years later, when original producer Angela Mancuso had lunch with Landon and remembered Half to Death, was the project resurrected.
Landon opted to send the script to Jason Blum of Blumhouse Productions, with whom he had previously worked on the Paranormal Activity sequels, and he approved it, resulting in Universal Pictures giving the film the green light.
On October 11, 2016, Blumhouse announced the project, with Landon directing and Jessica Rothe in the starring role. Along with Rothe and Israel Broussard, Ruby Modine, Charles Aitken, and Rachel Matthews were added to the cast on November 8, 2016. In June of 2017, the film was renamed Happy Death Day.
Tony Gardner, the same man who created the “Ghostface” mask from every Scream film, created the mask, and it was a one-of-a-kind design. Landon clarifies, “I was expecting my first son during preproduction.
I’m not sure if I was just thinking about infants or if I was subconsciously afraid of being a father, but that baby image kept popping up in my head.
Tony also created us a pig mask, but when I wore the baby mask to work and startled a coworker, we realized that this was it. This is the correct one.” Scream was listed as one of Christopher Landon’s influences for the picture, along with Halloween 1978, Groundhog Day, and others.
Given his goal of making a “fun, goofy horror movie,” he drew inspiration from 1980s comedies such as Sixteen Candles and Back to the Future.
He also wanted to comment on “this age of social media and all the nasty things that youngsters do to each other” by emulating the protagonist’s personal progress in Groundhog Day.
Writing
Scott Lobdell, a comic book writer, stated he wanted to play with the slasher genre’s cliches because “every slasher film opens with the mean girl getting killed and the good girl living until the end.
“How can I make the mean girl and the good girl the same person?” I wondered. Lori and Dr. Butler were the killers in the first draft.
“They were a sick duo murdering Tree together,” Landon adds. That didn’t work out for me in the end. Gregory seemed like an excellent candidate for being a suspect.
It didn’t help me turn him into a killer. That was a decision I was eager to make.” There was also no birthday and no romance in the original book, which Landon added to humanize Tree.
Because “trees need to develop, and you witness this character transition from one person to another,” Landon opted to shorten Teresa’s name to Tree, which also expressed her character arc.
Filming
Filming took place for 5 weeks at and around Loyola University in New Orleans, Louisiana. The sequences in which Tree wakes up in Carter’s bed following her death were shot over the course of two days.
The scene where Tree throws Lori out the window was scheduled to be shot at the sorority house, but the filming permission expired before production could begin, causing the setting to be shifted to a Los Angeles café that was previously featured in another Blumhouse film, The Purge.
Original ending
Tree is brought to the hospital in the original conclusion of the film after her interaction with Lori. Due to the severity of Tree’s injuries, the doctor advises her to refrain from taking pain medicine for at least a day. After he goes, a nurse enters and tells Tree that she is giving her something to help with the discomfort.
The doctor’s directions are relayed to Tree by the nurse. Stephanie Butler, Dr. Butler’s wife, reveals herself as the nurse and claims it is for her own discomfort. In retaliation for her husband’s romance with the girl, she murders Tree.
Music
Happy Death Day’s score was written by Bear McCreary. McCreary described the picture as having “a schizophrenic, dual personality, with light-hearted comedic scoring on one end, and genuinely horrific soundscapes on the other,” reflecting the film’s mix of horror and comedy.
The two main leitmotifs, an upbeat theme for Tree that evokes contemporary pop music, and one for the killer that comprises of distorted vocals provided by McCreary’s little daughter Sonatin, illustrate this approach.
To reflect the university setting, the percussion in the score is largely sampled from college marching band drum lines. While the film’s trailer featured 50 Cent’s “In Da Club” as Tree’s ringtone, Landon claimed the picture couldn’t afford to utilize the song and instead favored the comical “Busy Day Birthday” that music supervisor Andrea von Foerster improvised.
Home media
On January 2, 2018, the film was released in digital HD, and on January 16, 2018, it was released on DVD and Blu-Ray. The original ending is also included in the home release.
On April 26, 2022, Shout! Factory plans to release both Happy Death Day and Happy Death Day 2U on 4K disc. Exclusive new bonus content will be included in the releases.
Novelization
To coincide with the release of the second film, Blumhouse Books published a novelization penned by Aaron Hartzler titled Happy Death Day & Happy Death Day 2U on February 26, 2019.
FAQs About Happy Death Day
How Was the Acting in the Film?
The acting in the film was well done.
The acting in the film was well done. The actors did a great job of making you believe that they were their characters. The dialogue was believable and the actors were good at conveying emotions through their words and body language.
What was the Cinematography Like?
In Happy Death Day, the cinematography is a mix of both traditional and digital. The film was shot on film, but the director also used digital cameras.
The traditional cinematography helped to create a more old-fashioned feel for the movie. It also gave it a nostalgic look that made it seem like something you would see in an 80s horror movie.
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The director of Happy Death Day used both traditional and digital camera work to capture different moments in the movie. For example, when Tree gets into her first car accident, they use the digital camera to capture how she sees herself in the mirror as she is being pulled out of her car while they are using a traditional camera to show how she is being pulled out of her car from another perspective.
Conclusion:
In conclusion, Happy Death Day is a fun, suspenseful and creepy movie. It has a lot of good twists and turns that will keep you on the edge of your seat.
Image source: Wikipedia
