Tarot (2024)

"Interesting Premise Badly Lacking in Execution"

Who doesn't love a good body count movie with a fun premise and creative deaths? You know, like the FINAL DESTINATION or SAW series. Sometimes it takes a film that takes all the elements of those successful franchises and makes such a fumbling mess of everything to get you to appreciate the talent needed to make this sort of thing actually work. 

So step forward TAROT, a film that probably doesn't even realise its initial setup has already been superbly satirised in the (now more than ten years old) CABIN IN THE WOODS. In fact one potential way to enjoy TAROT is to watch it with a friend and pretend you're the two blokes in the office from Drew Goddard's film and scrumple up your betting slips when the kids eventually pick a tarot deck from all the weird stuff they find in a locked room in the creepy old house in which they're staying for the weekend.

They have their fortunes told, return to the normal life good-looking rich college kids always seem to have in these films, and then start to die in ways mirroring their fortune. Can the curse be stopped? Is there a lengthy and unnecessary explanation for why they're dying that as always renders the whole concept a lot less scary? Are there terrible lines of dialogue bad film fans may be quoting in the future?

Yes. Yes to all of it.

On the plus side the production design and photography are great, and James Swanton's turn as 'The Magician' is way too good for this film. On the negative and extremely frustrating side, TAROT could have been a lot of franchise kick-starting fun, but the execution of the central idea is just terrible. The fault for this can be laid squarely on the shoulders of the writer and the director. It seems Spenser Cohen and Anna Halberg were responsible for both, and on the basis of this we should be wary if we see their names on anything else. TAROT is bland, tired, and perfunctory when it's not being preposterous. It feels as if was directed by someone who couldn't stop yawning and wishing they were onto their next project. One for your friends who are very easily scared but not at all easily bored. 

TAROT is out on Digital from Sony now and available to rent or buy via the usual platforms