Wake Up

Anouk and Yoann-Karl Whissell are two-thirds of the French-Canadian director trio RKSS, aka Roadkill Superstars. They helm the new thriller Wake Up, minus their usual partner Francois Simard, but still credited as RKSS. Written by Alberto Marini, the movie doesn’t have the same absurdist comic energy as their post-apocalyptic breakout hit, Turbo Kid (2015), nor the overly nostalgic vibe of their slasher throwback Summer of 84 (2018). But if their latest has anything in common with their earlier features, it’s a tendency to place young people in the path of bloody danger. Wake Up is a mostly humorless independent production set in the present day, following a group of young people whose sole purpose seems to be supplying human fodder for the movie’s body count. But with a short runtime (under 76 minutes, not including credits), it’s barely a feature and doesn’t leave a lasting impression.  

A group of six activists breaks into a superstore to vandalize the place in protest of its policies, armed with paintball guns, animal masks, and vaguely stated ideals. They plan to trash the store and send a message about its unethical products. Their personalities and identities are beside the point; the movie hardly explores them, so I won’t either. In any case, the resident security guards, the alcoholic Jack (Aidan O’Hare) and bona fide sociopath Kevin (Turlough Convery), a primitive hunting enthusiast, worry about losing their jobs after recent incidents of vandalism. When their eventual confrontation with the intruders escalates, Kevin snaps, and the activists become his prey. Armed with makeshift weapons and booby traps, Kevin declares, with an unhinged glint in his eye, “We are all animals, and you’re in my hunting ground.” 

The filmmakers delight in crafting elaborate kills and gory, practical effects. However, they spend less time developing well-defined characters or creating a clear spatial geography for the superstore. Even a brief subplot exploring the victims’ internal lives might have imbued the material with some much-needed substance. Instead, the movie plays like pure, unfiltered premise, leaving no texture or dimension to the victims onscreen, making their deaths little more than empty displays of carnage. For a particular type of horror fan, that might be enough. After premiering at Fantastic Fest in 2023, Wake Up finally arrives in US theaters courtesy of Blue Fox Entertainment. It’s worth a late-night viewing but isn’t a rewatchable genre classic.