Films don’t get much buzzier than Bodies Bodies Bodies. There’s the concept – a slumber party that spirals into satire and violence thanks to the murder mystery-esque titular game. There’s the writer – Kristen Roupenian, author of the mega-viral 2017 short story Cat Person. Director Halina Reijn, who brought us Instinct in 2019. And there’s the stellar cast – which includes Shiva Baby’s Rachel Sennott, Borat standout Maria Bakalova, The Hate U Give’s Amanda Stenberg, comedy giant Pete Davidson, and literal giant Lee Pace. Watch the bloody new trailer below.
Fresh from a positively received premiere at SXSW Festival, Bodies Bodies Bodies takes place at a remote mansion, where seven young pals are having a party during a hurricane. With a real melting pot of personalities present – including recently sober Sophie (Stenberg) and her naive, working-class girlfriend Bee (Bakalova), super-rich David (Davidson), vacuous Alice (Sennott) and her much-older new boyfriend Greg (Pace) – the dynamic is awkward, so they decide to play ‘bodies bodies bodies’, a murder in the dark-style game, to break the ice. As you can gather from the screaming, crying, bleeding and shooting glimpsed in the trailer, the game does not go well, revealing back-stabbing and faux friendship amongst the group. When the gang discover an actual murder has taken place, they try to figure out who did it.
Like a kind of Gen X Scream, Bodies Bodies Bodies looks like a gruesome, hyper-self-aware, brutally good time, its satirical sheen set to skewer the stereotypical tendencies of today’s 20-somethings. Distributed by indie/genre favourites A24, it hits US cinemas on 5 August, with a UK release date yet to be confirmed.