No spoilers.
John Krasinski, our favorite romantic from NBC’s “The Office,” makes his horror debut with “A Quiet Place,” the story of a small family surviving on a farm while being hunted by a group of monsters with an acute sense of sound.
The family struggles to return to normalcy all while learning to live in a silent world because any sound means certain death.
I could go on and on about this movie and being insatiable, I do have complaints, but as I choked out half-formed thoughts to my fiance of the lingering Michael Bay shots left on the movie (he was a producer of the film), I realized I was being rather nit-picky.
The truth of the movie is that I sat on the edge of my seat the entire time and held back stifled “Come ON’s” throughout the entire movie. The silence is deafening, and any sound at all becomes incredibly startling.
Although the movie does use some of the overused sharp violin notes horror movies are known for, this movie seems to warrant it because so much of the film is genuinely silent. It was a rare instance in the theater where the audience was just as silent as the silent parts of the movie, no popcorn chomping or hushed whispering (there was one moment where an audience member yelled “Oh, no!” and the rest of us laughed).
My concerns were legitimate: the film uses one too many Bayhem shots, a pan of the camera around a character while they turn the other way, creating the most melodramatic shot possible, and the end turned just a bit campy, but I accepted it on the grounds that the rest of the movie was so intense I didn’t mind. In fact, I welcomed the levity.
But like I previously mentioned, the faults are easily overlooked, and my fiance never noticed either of them. She thought I being pretentious, and I might concede that I was.
In short, this was one of the most intense movie-watching experiences I have had in a long time, and it makes me really excited for the future of Krasinski (and his beard), especially since his first few directorial debuts have lacked luster.
I’ll be watching this movie again and I would recommend it to anyone with a stomach for horror.
Final rating: 9/10
A few small problems would fix the movie and place it high on the list of best movies of the year, not just horror, but it’s a riveting and terrifying experience regardless.
Story by
Andrew Leavitt
life@suunews.com
Photo courtesy of
Paramount Pictures
