Slasher film that ‘made fans want to throw up’ is finally heading to Netflix

A popular slasher film from 2023 that contained so much blood and gore it made fans ‘want to throw up’ will be added to Netflix very soon.

Horror movie Thanksgiving, from director and co-writer Eli Roth, was praised by audiences upon release as ‘the most fun’ they’d had in the cinema that year and a ‘10/10’ film ‘that saved the horror genre’, as well as boasting a strong 84% rating on Rotten Tomatoes from critics’ reviews.

And after a near two-year wait in the UK, patient horror fans will be rewarded next month when it finally hits the streaming platform over here on September 1.

Initially conceived as a fictitious exploitation trailer that played alongside Robert Rodriguez and Quentin Tarantino’s 2007 double feature Grindhouse, Roth decided to fully realise the gory, decapitation-happy and turkey-centred horror alongside screenwriter Roger Birnbaum.

Thanksgiving is set in Plymouth, Massachusetts – traditionally seen as the birthplace of the US holiday – following a tragic Black Friday riot, after which, a year later, a killer in a John Carver mask and pilgrim hat starts picking off residents one by one in gruesome revenge killings.

These include disembowelment, bludgeoning and a truly horrific and grisly turkey dinner, just as promised in the original concept trailer.

Starring Patrick Dempsey, Addison Rae, Nell Verlaque, Suits actor Rick Hoffman and Gina Gershon, Thanksgiving made $46.6million (£34.4m) on a budget of $15m (£11m) and was hailed the best film of Roth’s directorial career.

‘Thanksgiving is a gruesome graphic bloody gory movie with so many [sic] blood and gore [it] just literally makes you wanna throw up and you don’t know how much gore is going to be in the movie till you see all of the kills,’ enthused fan Jacob B on Rotten Tomatoes, while Jason S added: ‘Not usually a fan of gory horror, but there’s something fantastic about this movie. Absolutely love it! Watching this every Thanksgiving!’

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‘So good, and so creative, 10/10 an amazing slasher film,’ shared another fan – one of many to give it full marks – while Ralph R wrote: ‘Eli Roth’s Thanksgiving is exactly what you’d expect from the director of Hostel; gory, outrageous, and packed with shocking kills.’

‘[A] modern slasher that saves the genre that is horror,’ declared Michael J as Doni P called Thanksgiving ‘the most fun I had in a theatre in 2023’.

‘The ride gets crazier and bloodier as the bodies add up and the killings get more brutal!’ they added, suggesting that ‘even non-horror fans would enjoy’ the film.

‘Thanksgiving is the best directorial effort of Eli Roth’s career, and I don’t think it’s particularly close. The thrills are good, the gore is great, and I’m thankful for the bountiful harvest of slasher goodness the film provides,’ read ComicBook.com’s review.

Critic Maxance Vincent suggested he could ‘absolutely see this film becoming a new holiday classic, solely on its opening scene’, as GamesRadar’s review admired Thanksgiving’s ‘quite brilliant stomach-ripping, face-splitting practical effects’.

‘Served hot, Roth’s Thanksgiving is so good you’ll lick it off your fingers… or someone else’s,’ proclaimed IndieWire, while critic Douglas Davidson observed that the film ‘goes hard, though not as hard as Planet Terror in the gore department, but hard enough to unsettle stomachs and inspire eye aversion’.

Thanksgiving’s success has also seen a sequel greenlit, just weeks after its release in 2023, which is understood to start filming later this year.

Returning cast member Varlaque told Deadline in May: ‘I think we will be filming this year. I actually just saw Eli, and we’re talking about some plot points, so I’m really excited for it.’

Roth’s initial announcement had shared that he and co-writer Jeff Rendell were ‘taking a year to really get the script right, working on it starting today!’ with a planned 2025 release date.

Thanksgiving will be streaming on Netflix from September 1.

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Have you seen Thanksgiving? What did you think?