What's it about? Part homage to the slasher film, part complete and total dissection of the horror genre, the Joss Whedon-scripted The Cabin In The Woods follows the ubiquitous group of high school kids as they take a break from civilization and find themselves picked off one by one by a sadistic family. Meanwhile, the audience sees that it's all part of a highly orchestrated and well-funded ritual to appease ancient gods with sacrifices. How does it end? The hapless protagonists survive until the end, thus failing to propitiate the Ancient Ones with their deaths and unleashing them on Earth, bringing about its destruction. Why was it controversial? Believe it or not, some thought the shift up into something as epic as the unleashing of Ancient Gods was taking things too far (hadn't they been paying attention to what went before?). It's a problem a lot of filmmakers have experienced when writing satire - some audiences just don't get it when things aren't meant to be taken literally.
