Let me begin by saying that I no longer trust IMDB or Rotten Tomatoes to judge films that are not guaranteed hits. Twice in the last month I have gone to the cinema, settled in, and got ready for the promise of two hours of great entertainment, based on fantastic reviews, only to be massively disappointed.
A Quiet Place, it looked like a great film in the trailers and was further hyped by the review machine, which promised a 9/10 quality experience. I was entranced by these reviews as most horror genre films barely manage a 6/10 if they are fantastic films.
Sadly to say, A Quiet Place doesn’t match to these films that received a much lower score.
Why is that you may ask.
First, the whole film is based on one gimmick and it gets old fast. Fifteen minutes into the film I was telling myself, “Alright, you can find a way to talk now because this silence nonsense is putting me to sleep.”
Second, the method finally used to kill the monsters was WAY TOO OBVIOUS and made no sense that no one else in the world had figured that out immediately after they arrived.
Third, I would have been much more interested in how these things showed up. Where are they from? How did they destroy society? I would have liked any information on the creatures, but there was absolutely none. In place of any back story we only see some newspaper clippings here and there that show how these things popped up over night and killed everyone and are, by all accounts, indestructible. But, in the end, we find out they are actually pretty easy to kill.
Fourth, the plot is driven by the events not the other way around. Unlike well told stories where the events are built up by the plot and brought to a satisfying head in the climax, this film’s flimsy premise was completely dependent on slim chance events driving the characters aimlessly tripping through the dark. All the major plot points were heavily driven by random chance events that didn’t always make sense. The only answer for their happening was that if they did not, then the suspense couldn’t happen.
With all that said, there was suspense and great intensity built by the set pieces and sound design. It just wasn’t enough for me to feel satisfied with spending my money on viewing the film.
WARNING: Below are spoilers for A Quiet Place.
To skip this section, scrolled past until you see: *** End of spoilers***
I will now explain myself further regarding each of the items above using examples from the film.
The first item is pretty self-explanatory. The silence gimmick was fun for the first ten minutes then became extremely irritating. The film was just not creative enough to drive the gimmick home for 90 minutes. I was really only fun until that kid got himself killed because of that spaceship toy we saw in the trailer. Yup, Jim wasn’t fast enough.
Item two, how the hell did the military or the police or some random prepper not figure out, for over a year, that the monster with a giant crazy-sensitive ear can be killed with as simple high pitched frequency? It seems like common sense. Hell, we already use weapons like this to disperse crowds and protestors. Are you honestly expecting me to believe that they never tried weapons they already had on these things? Sorry, no dice.
Item three, there is no back story. None. I would have been much happier with a Cloverfield-esque origin story for these things versus the garbage I found in the theater.
Item four, this item is just plain lazy. There are too many items to note. The two biggest for me where: One, the nail in the middle of the staircase that the mother accidentally bent straight up without noticing just so she could step on the thing latter and make a noise just as she is giving birth. I’m sorry, no. There aren’t random nails sticking out of the middle of steps, especially not the business end of the thing. And, her raggedy bag would have shredded long before bending a nail that thick straight up.
Two, the water pipes flooding the basement where the mother is hiding with her her newborn. Jim leaves the basement to rush after the kids, who are stranded in the fields with monsters all around. Somehow, in this silent world, he just doesn’t hear a burst pipe spewing water into the basement right next to the door he used. WHAT!?!?! This event causes all kinds of mayhem. And, he walked right by it! It just doesn’t make sense.
***** End of Spoilers *****
To conclude, A Quiet Place is awful. Do not waste your money. Only watch it if you love suspense and crazy tense films and do not care about the back story and glaring plot holes and lapses in common sense won’t bother you. For me, this film is one I will never revisit. But, I would like to say that this film could have made an excellent novel. I think with the right tweaks in story, it could have been a fantastic written piece. But, sadly, on the big screen it just doesn’t shine.