After the "parody" movies of the 2000s comes The Cabin in the Woods, a lesson in how to poke fun at a genre while still telling a compelling story. It incorporates all the clichés of the horror genre but in a clever way that all ties together. Even when you think you know what's going to happen, the film goes off the rails and goes into completely new territory.

Chris Hemsworth, Kristen Connolly, Anna Hutchison, Jesse Williams, and Fran Kranz are five college friends who head off for a weekend at a secluded cabin in the woods. It's a simple classic horror setup. What follows is a series horror classic discoveries, and finally the shocking truth.

Director Drew Goddard co-writes with Joss Whedon as they bring a smart spin on the traditional horror. It's easy to see how this is the work of movie fans. They definitely know the horror genre. Chris Hemsworth is proving his movie hunk status. This is best described as a mastercrafted movie.

For the first hour of its running time, THE CABIN IN THE WOODS is a fairly awful movie. It comes across as a semi-spoof of THE EVIL DEAD and all of its ilk with one of those oh-so-witty post-modern twists, in which the whole set-up is being televised and broadcast a la THE TRUMAN SHOW. For this first hour, the film is saddled with an obnoxious script and the kind of characters you'd find in a cheesy B-movie. I'm not quite sure what Joss Whedon was thinking.

Then, at around the hour mark, there's a huge, huge twist and the film becomes something else entirely. It becomes a higher-budgeted spin on the likes of CUBE, and then of course there's a sudden onslaught of monsters which will delight any fans of the horror genre. Sadly, copyright means that some of the monsters only resemble cinematic creations of old, like the Lord of Bondage and Pain guy who looks like Pinhead from HELLRAISER but isn't. Imagine if they'd had the rights to show all the great movie creatures - now that would have been great!

So, for the finale, this film becomes a post-modern spoof with references to anything and everything, not least my old favourite, H. P. Lovecraft. The thing it most brings to mind, for me, are the two WAXWORKS movies with their celebration of the depth and breadth of horror movie monsters. The CGI effects are passable, and the script is never as good as it thinks it is, but it is quite a bit of fun at the end. THE CABIN IN THE WOODS as a whole doesn't hang together and both acting and direction are bland, but it's a film that's been purpose built to appeal to movie fans so it's worth at least a single watch.