Directed by John Krasinski
* * * 1/2
A Quiet Place forced me to make a strange observation: boy, there’s
a ton of sound in our everyday existence. So much that we don’t recognize it,
from traffic cruising down the road to commercial airliners traversing the
skies. Now imagine living in a world where all of that is practically
non-existent, but to make the slightest noise will result in a horrifying fate.
Picturing this is not only surreal, but also difficult because there’s so much
sound going on around us we don’t even notice, but A Quiet Place believably paints this world with a terrifying color
palette. Oh, the things we take for granted.
Some sort of apocalypse has
stricken the world, and it’s the 89th day after when A Quiet Place opens. Pretty typical
post-apocalyptic setting: cars stopped in the middle of the road, trash riddled
on the sidewalks, crumpled newspapers headline the fate of the world. We meet a
family of five scavenging a general store, and they are intensely cautious with
every move they make, taking their time with every item they take off the
shelf, tiptoeing on bare feet, and speaking in sign language. A toy catches the
eyes of the youngest (about 5 or 6), but dad doesn’t let him take it – “Too
loud”. They move on from the store, but not before the older sister hands the
boy the toy. Because of this, they become a family of four on the walk home.
We catch up with this family a
little over a year later. They’ve settled into a farm house, and they have adapted
to this world quite well, and life seems good…all things considered. But good
things can’t last forever: the father and son go out to the wilderness, the daughter
goes to visit the grave of her youngest brother, and the mother, who is
expected to deliver a baby in the coming weeks, is doing chores when her water
breaks. Nobody around to help her, nobody to call out to…let’s just say it’s
going to be a long night.
The number one concern of A Quiet Place is not only establishing but
maintaining the atmosphere of a world so unreal to us. Not an easy task, but A Quiet Place not succeeds, but succeeds
cleverly. The film never stops for bloated or redundant exposition – it tells
us everything we need to know about the world minutes after the film starts, and the most mundane of tasks become
do-or-die trials by fire. Oh, and vocal dialogue is substituted with subtitled
sign language.
What may matter to some in a
film is not the little details, but the big picture. Fair enough, but never
forget that the big picture is made up of those little details, and A Quiet Place never forgets this:
characters are never seen with any kind of footwear on (though you’d think they’d
at least wear socks). In a scene where the children play a game of Monopoly,
game pieces are replaced by felt and cotton balls (dice are rolled on the
carpet). All of these careful details set a cement-solid foundation of A Quiet Place, and it makes the climactic
third act all the more terrifying.
But at the center of all this
terror and tension is a family, wonderfully played by Emily Blunt (mother),
John Krasinski (father), Millicent Simmonds (daughter), and Noah Jupe (son) –
according to IMDb, the characters do have names, but I don’t think they were
ever referred to by name the entire movie. Horror fans might be somewhat bored
throughout the first half of A Quiet
Place. After the horrific opening scene, the film goes a long time without
anything really happening; the film just shows this family and their daily
lives in this apocalypse, but it is all quite touching. The daughter blames herself
for the death of her youngest brother (she gave him the toy, after all). The
son is terrified of going into the wilderness with his father, but it turns out
to be a warm father-son kind of day. There is a moment where they relax at a
waterfall and let out loud hollers – this was a borderline tear-jerking joyous
moment.
To those same horror fans that
may be put off by the family drama, trust me when I say that it is worth the
climactic third act. I’ve already mentioned the general set-up of the scenario
(and it’s in the trailers), but it’s always worth it to see for yourself. The
utter horror of the creatures is also a morbid sight to behold. We never get a
good look at the creatures except for a few moments near the end, but the best
way I can them; imagine demonic Phasmatodea that took predatory lessons from Jurassic Park’s velociraptors.
I must say that I wasn’t 100% in
belief of the setup of the climax, being the mother’s pregnancy. It’s one thing
if the delivery was due within at least a month, but she was due just a couple
of weeks before the incident, and I can’t help but feel like if this were actually
happening, the family would stick around the house until after the baby is born
unless they’re in dire need of
supplies (which is not implied in the movie). This wasn’t enough to make me
stop caring about the family, nor was it a brightly glaring issue, but it still
kind of irked me. But that’s really the one complaint I have.
Great horror usually has one
of two effects: either it haunts the viewer for days, or it relentlessly
assaults the viewer the entire runtime, and A
Quiet Place fits perfectly in the latter. On top of being an unbearably
tense experience, but it is also clever in its setup and confident in its
execution, and that makes for an exceptional film. As for me, I left the
theater not cautious of my movements, but I was certainly more aware of the
noise my steps made. Perhaps I shouldn't have worn my Doc Martens.
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