A thing I love about In A Violent Nature is that it does such a good job offering an answer as to why the slasher in slasher movies goes over the top killing all the campers even though usually only, like, one of them really has any reason to be targeted if that... and it pretty much amounts to said campers being REALLY fucking annoying.
Slasher movies all too often have this problem with the cast all being these obnoxious or downright despicable people that hog the screen with insipid relationship melodrama and just get on your nerves til the killer gets them. And so this movie takes that cliche to it's logical conclusion. It makes zero attempt to pretend that the victims are anything but the sort of people who in real life you would want to punch in the face the very instant they opened their mouths. Hell, they barely even come off like functional human beings.
When they aren't screaming in terror, every line from them is completely smarmy and smug, like they think they're the funniest person in the world but can't even get through a knock knock joke without saying some racist. Either that, or ear-splitting whining and bickering about irrelevant nonsense. Their personalities are all interchangeably that of an influencer who would steal your dog than shriek "it's just a prank, bro!" when caught. They treat the forest like a playground where they can do whatever they want. They aren't even nice to each other; they're ostensibly friends and yet seem to do nothing but talk to each other like shit and clearly only hang out because nobody else can stand them.
Like, you watch that scene around the campfire and each and every characters' dialogue seems designed to make them as utterly insufferable and unlikable as possible. From making lame jokes that drag on way too long or laughing about sex abuse and murder. To just constantly yammering over each other's words in a way that'd be infuriating in real life. And you see Johnny watching from the treeline and he's not emoting dramatically but you can just TELL the teens are like nails in his ears. They're filling him with rage. Or you get to the bit with the toy car and watch as Johnny seems to want to just chill out and have a nice day, only for the constant noise and whining from the teens to make him lose all ability to focus and storm off upset and disappointed as much as angry. The only one who seems even remotely, authentically human is Kris, who in true slasher fashion is the final girl by virtue of being the only person anyone can tolerate.
And somehow you understand. You maybe find yourself thinking, "if these people walked onto my property, I would stop at nothing to kill every single one of them just so I wouldn't have to listen to it anymore". It's movie magic of a sort. The whole movie is told from the perspective of the slasher, and as part of the process, it gives you an idea of what might push someone or something to act like that; blind anger boiling over from having your home and person disrespected by some of the worst kind of people imaginable. And through that understanding, coupled with a ton of other aspects of the movie, it sets you into Johnny's state of mind, in a manner almost like gonzo journalism.
You almost kind of forget the whole "crazed zombie killing people" thing and feel like you're watching something more mundane, fitting with the film's toying with moods and comparisons of slashers to wildlife. At many points it stops feeling like a horror movie and instead seems to become a quiet indie drama about a native of a rural area dealing with a bunch of disrespectful tourists... right up until Johnny starts killing again.
All because the characters he's hunting are just THAT irritating.
