Save Yourselves!
| Save Yourselves! | |
|---|---|
 Official poster | |
| Directed by |
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| Written by |
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| Produced by |
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| Starring | |
| Cinematography | Matt Clegg |
| Edited by | Sofi Marshall |
| Music by | Andrew Orkin |
Production companies |
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| Distributed by | Bleecker Street |
Release dates |
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Running time | 93 minutes |
| Country | United States |
| Language | English |
| Box office | $301,162[1][2] |
Save Yourselves! is a 2020 American science fiction comedy film written and directed by Alex Huston Fischer and Eleanor Wilson,[3] and starring John Paul Reynolds and Sunita Mani. The film premiered at the 2020 Sundance Film Festival.[4] It was released on October 2, 2020,[5] by Bleecker Street.[6]
Plot
Su and Jack, a 30-something millennial couple, decide to disconnect from their Internet-obsessed superficial lives in Brooklyn by turning off their phones for a week and staying at a remote cabin owned by their friend Raph. During their stay, Jack notices a fuzzy ball-like object in the den, which Su calls a "pouffe". While Jack is outside, Su secretly turns on her phone and listens to several strange voicemails from her mother about "giant rats" infesting New York City, that seem to consume ethanol. After a night of drinking, while the couple make love in front of a large window, Raph has arrived at the cabin but falls to the ground, revealing a "pouffe" behind him.
The couple awaken to find that Jack's sourdough starter is empty and their bottle of whiskey has been drained. Su realizes that both contained ethanol, and that the "pouffe" may be one of the giant rats her mother was rambling about. The couple hide upstairs and turn on their phones, finding they've lost signal but learning from various voicemails and texts that the "pouffes" are aliens which feed on ethanol, and that have invaded New York, forcing an emergency evacuation. Preparing to escape back to the city, the couple find that the aliens have drained their car's gasoline (due to its ethanol content). They find a Land Rover in the barn with a full tank of diesel, which the aliens ignore feeding on.
Driving through the woods, they come across another couple driving a truck, who are promptly killed by an alien. Recalling the alien's sustenance, Jack throws a bottle of wine at a distance to lure the alien into the woods. The scent of ethanol distracts the alien, which sprays a pheromone and hovers into the forest, clearing their path. Su and Jack hear a baby crying in the other couple's truck, and begrudgingly go back to rescue it. A woman hiding in the other truck emerges and holds them at gunpoint before driving off in the diesel-powered Land Rover, leaving the couple and the baby stranded in the woods. When the couple begin hallucinating due to the alien's pheromones, Su injects Jack and herself with two needles of epinephrine from the truck, knocking them unconscious.
They wake up to find an alien near the baby, who had crawled away while they were unconscious. When the alien shoots its proboscis at Jacks’ chest, Su grabs a knife and cuts it off, which deflates and kills the alien. In an ironic twist, it is revealed that Jack's cell phone (stored in his breast pocket) aided in saving him from the alien attack. While climbing to a lookout point along the trail, they investigate a translucent structure growing out of the ground nearby. On discovering that their phones have regained signal, they check for information and call 911. Meanwhile, while they are distracted by their technology, the structure changes shape to trap them and the baby inside a sound-proof bubble, which gradually ascends beyond the atmosphere, revealing numerous other bubbles also rising into space from all over the Earth.
Cast
- John Paul Reynolds as Jack "Jackie" Wyndam
- Sunita Mani as Surina "Su" Raji
- Ben Sinclair as Raph
- John Early as Blake
- Jo Firestone as Desi
- Johanna Day as Judy
- Amy Sedaris as the voice of Jack's mother
- Zenobia Shroff as the voice of Su's mother
Release
The film had its world premiere at the Sundance Film Festival on January 25, 2020.[7][8] Shortly after, Bleecker Street acquired distribution rights to the film.[9] It was released on October 2, 2020,[citation needed] and is available on Hulu in the United States.
Television series
A television series adaptation of the film for Hulu is in the works at Keshet Studios and Universal Television.[10][citation needed]
Critical reception
Save Yourselves holds a Certified Fresh 89% approval rating on review aggregator website Rotten Tomatoes, based on 91 reviews, with an average of 6.7/10. The site's critical consensus reads, "Save Yourselves! doesn't do anything unexpected with its one-joke premise -- but fortunately, that one joke turns out to be consistently funny anyway."[11] Stephanie Zacharek from Time magazine praised the film, saying, "It takes itself just seriously enough, but not too seriously."[12]
References
- ^ "Save Yourselves! (2020)". Box Office Mojo. Retrieved October 23, 2020.
- ^ "Save Yourselves! (2020) - Financial Information". The Numbers. Retrieved October 23, 2020.
- ^ Lussier, Germaine (January 21, 2020). "21 Intriguing Sundance Movies That Could Become 2020's Sleeper Genre Hits". Gizmodo. Retrieved January 21, 2020.
- ^ "Sundance announces 2020 Screenwriters Lab participants". Park Record. December 27, 2019. Retrieved January 21, 2020.
- ^ Rotten Tomatoes — Save Yourselves!
- ^ "Save Yourselves!". Bleecker Street. Retrieved August 24, 2020.
- ^ Siegel, Tatiana (December 4, 2019). "Sundance Unveils Female-Powered Lineup Featuring Taylor Swift, Gloria Steinem, Abortion Road Trip Drama". The Hollywood Reporter. Retrieved August 24, 2020.
- ^ "Save Yourselves!". Sundance Film Festival. Archived from the original on September 28, 2020. Retrieved August 24, 2020.
- ^ D'Alessandro, Anthony (February 13, 2020). "'Save Yourselves!' Alien Sci-Fi Comedy Nabbed By Bleecker Street After Sundance Bow". Deadline Hollywood. Retrieved August 24, 2020.
- ^ Peter White (2 February 2021). "Universal TV & Keshet Studios Developing TV Adaptation Of Sci-Fi Comedy Feature 'Save Yourselves!' After Extending First-Look Deal". Deadline. Retrieved 15 February 2021.
- ^ "Save Yourselves! (2020)". Rotten Tomatoes. Fandango. Retrieved October 10, 2021.
- ^ "Save Yourselves! Is an Engaging, Timely Sci-Fi Comedy About the Need to Unplug". TIME Magazine. Retrieved October 27, 2020.