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Watching “Send Help” feels like a botched beach day; there’s enough to keep you entertained, but multiple oversights — like forgotten sunscreen and sand-covered food — turn a potentially great trip into an adequate one.

Returning to his horror-comedy roots, director Sam Raimi’s “Send Help” balances laughs and jump scares. But, despite raising thought-provoking themes and featuring an exceptional performance from Rachel McAdams, a safe script limits Raimi’s creativity and makes “Send Help” feel somewhat redundant.

The film follows Linda Liddle (McAdams), a high-strung corporate employee who’s ostracized by her coworkers. Linda was promised the company’s vice president position by her former boss. After the boss dies, his son and new CEO, Bradley Preston (Dylan O’Brien), takes over and doesn’t fulfill his father’s promise.

As the number-crunching backbone of the company, Linda flies with Bradley and other executives to Bangkok. The business trip goes wrong when violent, stormy weather causes the plane to crash into the ocean. Linda survives the crash and makes it to a remote island near Thailand. Here, she finds an unconscious Bradley, who suffered a severe leg injury, washed up on the shore.

Because of her resourcefulness and obsession with the show “Survivor,” Linda can provide food, water and shelter for her and Bradley. Later, Linda sees a boat offshore but is reluctant to call for help; she wants to remain on the island since she enjoys the challenge of trying to survive.

I was hesitant to see “Send Help” because of its overplayed deserted island trope, but co-writers Damian Shannon and Mark Swift gave me enough new meat to chew on.

“Send Help” cleverly comments on power dynamics while exploring humans’ primal instincts. Compared to the workplace, Bradley and Linda switch roles when they’re on the island. Bradley, an egotistical CEO, is belittled by Linda’s survival skills. Although there is one similarity between the office and the island: Bradley’s success is dependent on Linda.

Raimi cleverly builds Linda’s character, hinting at her survival skills. Early on, he pans across her bookshelf that’s filled with survival guides and shows her watching an episode of “Survivor.”

Linda deservedly finds herself in a position of power, but despite feeling like the victim, she reveals her own streaks of questionable morality.

When Bradley and Linda are drinking pruno (homemade alcohol) around a fire, Linda mentions her dead husband. She explains that he was a mean drunk and after a fight, she voluntarily gave him his car keys (which she usually hid), leading to his death in a car accident. This tidbit foreshadows Linda’s dark side, which brilliantly plays into the film’s climax.

Though she once seemed harmless, Linda kills Bradley’s wife, Zuri (Edyll Ismail), and a boat captain (Thaneth Warakulnukroh) who found the island. She also slaughters a wild boar earlier in the film — likely a nod to William Golding’s novel “Lord of the Flies.”

Speaking of “Lord of the Flies,” a story with an abundance of characters, a pitfall of “Send Help” is the lack thereof. While McAdams and O’Brien are great, with only two leads on the island, their dynamic eventually becomes stale. While the back-and-forth conflict produces some fantastic moments, the story can be redundant, even with a shorter runtime of under two hours.

The writers could’ve redeemed themselves by exploring Linda’s guilt, but they merely scratched the surface. After killing Zuri, Linda has a nightmare that made me jump in my seat. Part of the sequence shows Zuri crawling out of the ocean, showing that her death haunts Linda.

For this moment, the co-writers delve into the paranormal, but they don’t stick with it for long. “Cast Away,” a movie with just one character stranded on an island, effectively explores the psychological impact of isolation — something I wished “Send Help” approached more directly.

The film may leave a lot on the table, but McAdams’ performance absolutely does not. O’Brien was great, but, to put it lightly, McAdams carries “Send Help.” Because Linda is such a layered role, McAdams gets to show off her versatility.

In the beginning, Linda feels like a quirky, middle-aged high school English teacher, which McAdams plays perfectly. By the end of the film, she is a cold-blooded killer.

During the final scene, she’s off the island and cruising down a road. McAdams stares intensely at the camera while her character’s karaoke song plays, “One Way or Another” by Blondie. She sings along: “One way or another, I’m gonna find ya / I’m gonna get ya, get ya, get ya, get ya.” It’s a moment that’s dark and clever, referencing Linda’s quirky side (with her karaoke pick) and her malicious side.

Even though I think the film’s Rotten Tomatoes scores are egregiously high — they shouldn’t be anywhere near Raimi’s “Spider-Man” or “Spider-Man 2” ratings — I do applaud the director’s creativity.

Reminiscent of the horror from his “Evil Dead” trilogy, Raimi has a knack for incorporating comedic elements into horror films. Major frights are rather scarce in “Send Help,” but the laughs are recurring.

The moment that sums up Raimi’s tone is when Linda pretends to castrate Bradley. At first, my jaw dropped; I was squirmish and surprised. But when Linda revealed it was just a rat that squirted blood, I gave a sigh of relief and laughed.

“Send Help” may seem repetitive or safe at times, but being backed by vintage Raimi tropes and a phenomenal McAdams performance makes it worthwhile.

Published on February 3, 2026 at 11:16 pm
Contact Joel: jdpelach@syr.edu