Starring John Krasinski, Emily Blunt, Millicent Simmons, Noah Jupe

(6-Good Film)

Tense. Interesting. Solid.

Set forward a few years in an agricultural town, the Abbot family, dad, Lee (Krasinski), mom, Evelyn (Blunt), teenage daughter, Regan (Simmons), and two sons, Marcus and Beau, live in a post-apocalyptic state of sorts, as a swarm of sightless creatures have taken over the planet. These creatures have hypersonic hearing, and attack any and all sound, so the Abbot family attempt to stick together without the luxury of noise. It’s an ultra tense premise for a film, and the result is a suitably strong monster flick. There’s one especially memorable scene in the middle of the film (if you’ve seen the trailer, you can guess which one I’m referring to), and the family dynamic makes for endearing drama. Hitchcock once explained suspense in terms of waiting for a bomb to go off. You have the explosion, which is one thing, but the anticipation of the explosion is the suspense.This is a solid movie, but where it falls short in my eyes is the explosion part. The suspense is done well, but the moments when the monsters hit pay dirt aren’t as satisfying as they could have been (remember Jaws devouring Robert Shaw?).

-Walter Tyrone Howard-

(227)