Eli Roth gleefully mixes excessive gore with some good laughs in “Thanksgiving”, his new film based on the American holiday that (these days) is more about turkeys, football, and Christmas shopping than any notion of actual thankfulness. Roth’s unapologetically silly slasher-comedy spends as much time taking shots at what the holiday has become as it does gruesomely offing its hapless gaggle of victims, often in various Thanksgiving themed ways.

Written by Jeff Rendell, the story is fittingly set in Plymouth, Massachusetts where in the opening 15 minutes we witness a tragic yet undeniably hilarious Black Friday incident. A feral crowd of shoppers storm a local RightMart store as they open for their Black Friday sale. With too little security, the store quickly loses control. Chaos and violence erupts and three people are killed. Overall it’s a situation that’s clearly intended to be preposterous. But at the same time, Roth shoots it dead-seriously which only makes it funnier.

One year later, Plymouth has mostly put the Black Friday tragedy behind them. But with Thanksgiving fast approaching, the community learns that someone is not quite ready to forget. A sadistic serial killer known as (wait for it…..) “John Carver” soon begins living up to his name – slicing, stuffing, and basting the terrified local townsfolk in preparation for his own macabre Thanksgiving Day feast.

The film stars the recently crowned Sexiest Man Alive (according to People magazine), Patrick Dempsey. He plays Sheriff Eric Newlon who was at RightMart on that fateful Black Friday. Now he’s tasked with finding who’s killing his citizens in an assortment of gruesome ways. Of course the movie introduces us to a host of locals, providing many of them with ample motives to be put on our suspect list. Among them is the owner of RightMart, Thomas Wright (Rick Hoffman), his avaricious wife Kathleen (Karen Cliche), a grieving father (Ty Olsson), just to name a few.

And as is the norm for slashers, we get a group of shallow teens who make you fear for the future of our world the longer you’re around them. Of course several of them end up as fodder for the killer. But as usual there is the lone tolerable one who has some sense and earns a little sympathy. Here it’s Jessica (Nell Verlaque) who almost immediately gives off ‘Final Girl’ vibes. Then again, Roth throws enough at us to where we’re never quite certain who to suspect and who to trust.

As you might expect, the kills are aplenty. Not only are they garishly gory, but in many cases they’re quite original. Roth spares no creative expense (or bodily organ) in slaughtering his mostly disposable victims. Unfortunately that same attention isn’t given to the script which only exists to usher us from one bloody murder to the next. To his credit, Roth moves us along pretty quick and doesn’t allow us much time to think about things. But it eventually catches up to him, especially in the big reveal that doesn’t make a lot sense and has some pretty hard-to-miss logistical problems.

That’s not the only place where the writing lets the movie down. Rendell’s dialogue can be as grating as it is exhausting. Characters sling f-bombs like they’re on a counter yet rarely (if ever) get lines that might offer actual depth. And while the movie teases a satirical bite early on, it ends up having no teeth whatsoever and any satire all but vanishes in the second half which goes into straight B-movie genre mode.

Those may sound like petty gripes, especially for a movie with a clear ‘back to slasher basics’ approach. But they’re what make “Thanksgiving” an amusing time-passer rather than a new slasher-comedy classic. The pieces are all there – a great setting, delightfully grisly kills, and a good self-awareness (the hysterical tagline “There will be no leftovers” still cracks me up”). But Roth is so focused on some parts that he shortchanges others. Then again, are we supposed to care about such things in a movie like this or just get onboard for the ride? You decide. “Thanksgiving” is in theaters now.

VERDICT – 3 STARS