Reviews

I like a good thriller, but I'm determined that they just don't exist anymore. I remember at one point, I busted out laughing during this one and in case you need a sign that the movie has flown off the rail, when the genre changes mid-movie from thriller to comedy and you find yourself hoping the antagonist kills everyone just so it can be over in a timely manner, you've made a terrible film. The basis of the film doesn't make any sense. The main character does one dumb thing after another and half the film is spent with her locked inside of a bathroom. Meanwhile, she kills her own mother, the "crazy lady" kills both her neighbors and two cops whom (neither shoots her and the first doesn't bother to call for backup or clue his "rookie" partner in on what's going on so that she can call backup either) -- it's just ridiculousness on top of ridiculousness and you get to a point where you just lose interest in the movie. The cherry on the sundae is that the crazy lady is obsessed with the baby yet she's flinging the pregnant mother around and causing her all sorts of stress which could only result in a miscarriage but hey - who am I to point out common sense facts.

I'm so tired of so called thrillers that use stupidty as the driving engine. You reach a point of ridiculousness where you get fed up and start rooting for the villains. Like how long can you stand there after you see someone get shot in the head? Or even better why would you try to go back and negotiate with said shooter? Why would you try to "rescue" someone when you don't know their level of involvement in something as serious as this? When there's who knows how many people after you, why do you spend 10 minutes crying and sliding on an engagement ring? An old car that...you guessed it...stalls when you try to start it? Really?! Not cliche at all. Four stars is being very generous.

I wanted to really love this movie - it had a good cast and an enticing trailer - but then I started watching and plot holes galore just ruined it. For starts, who stores millions of dollars in their home? Keep in mind, if there were ever a house fire, burglary, etc. this is money that's uninsured. Let's forget about that though and fast forward to the next big plot hole: the lady that tries to call 911 on the way to her Mercedes. So the call goes thru and you hear the operator and then she gets knocked out and her throat is slit. In 2018, the next thing that would happen is there would be an attempt to call her back because it would considered a 911 hangup call and then police would be dispatched when that failed - never happens. Then theres the truck scene fiasco -- the truck stalls of course (do modern vehicles even stall anymore?), then there's the part where they back the truck over one of the burglars and drive forward over him...in a truck..ran over twice...and he still survives. And then they drive the truck into a tree and this is while she's looking forward and driving...into the tree...that's been on her property for how long? Then it gets worse when the husband shows up. He sees a Mercedes door open, purse on the ground and more blood than the OJ Simpson crime scene and he continues to walk towards the house screaming versus going back to his car a few feet back and driving off and calling 911 like a sane, rational person would do. Mind you, as he keeps walking he sees body after body after body and somehow he still feels this is the best time to puff out your chest and beat on it while simultaneously assuming that what looks like a serial murder took place would kill all but spare his family. All in all had potential but lazy. cliche writing killed it.

Imagine every cliche thing you know you shouldn't do in a horror movie: tripping and falling, being completely oblivioust to your surroundings, vehicles stalling, keys being left outside the car, getting injured, laughing crying and being loud when you're supposed to be in hiding. The writers and directors took every dumb thing you could possibly do in a hororr movie and combined it with a non-existent plot and terrible dialogue and/or character development. Then they slapped a bow on it and called it "The Strangers: Prey at Night" just for you to enjoy. Full sarcasm intended. This is why the horror/thriller genre has a bad reputation.

The movie was good all the way up until the second-half of the movie. It very much reminded me of Last House on the Left. Writing towards the end got lazy and sloppy to the point where the plot holes really started to sink the movie for me. For instance, the part where Beth flips the SUV and the cop musters up the strength to come check on her notably without calling for backup or reporting what's going on. Or there's the part in the hospital where they're doing life-saving, emergency surgery, extracting bullet fragments from this girl's cheek and yet she's not even under? And she's just conscious enough to scribble out on a random and convenient white board? And the brother that spends much of the movie with a life-threatening wound that should have probably killed him, looks good as new months later when in reality he portably would've contracted some kind of infection and died.

To summarize, I feel like that Randy Jackson's words from the Geico commercial sum it up best: "yo check it out dawg, that was just alright for me. I mean you got the walk, you got the stance, but I wasn't feeling this. You gotta come a little harder, you gotta figure it out. Ehhhhhh I don't know."

The visual effects in the movie were much more amazing than the movie itself, especially during the half-time show. Even after the movie's concluded I find myself sitting here, wondering and thinking just what the movie was supposed to accomplish and did it do it? Certain aspects of the movie are touching and heart-felt, while a majority fail to stick the landing they were going for. The ending fight scene was ridiculous and if a gun was fired inside a building in a crowded stadium, someone would've gone to jail for it, no matter their rank. I understand the need to want to create drama, but let's color in the lines and not over-exaggerate (i.e. the soldiers act more like a group of frat boys than they do actual soldiers). I'll circle back to the cinematography - it was truly top notch and the war scenes were alluring, but it seems like there's a ton of build-up to the half-time show and while thats visually the best part of the movie, it just seems like there was no substance otherwise.

I went into this movie with no expectations and left filling delighted, curious and enlightened. The movie moves at a weird pace, the beginning part to the death scene moving more rapidly and then the rest of the film kind of continuing on at a much slower pace. What made it unique and good is that it's told from the perspective of the ghost as usually when we think of loss, movies are told from the perspective of the surviving person. Loss being such a relatable topic, it was an opportunity to do something different and a well-executed one at that. To all the people whining about a pie scene, movies are a form of art. These are the same people that can go see a Marvell or DC movie and give it 10 stars, although a scene showing someone in agony over loss is 'too long' and thusly unrealistic. Beyond that, there's a beautiful marriage of emotion and music - whoever did the score and picked the music did a 9/10 job. The height of the movie for me was the scene when the ghost absolutely loses it and starts wrecking the house with the family in it. There are so many paranormal TV shows and movies out there and most of the time they make ghosts look like these malicious beings that just wreck havoc and yell "get out" but the thing we've never gotten is a "WHY" - Why are ghosts like this? This movie explains that to you in a thought- provoking and believable way. The only parts of the movie that were a little weird, fuzzy or that I would've done differently are. (1) It would've been more believable that the tiny house in the middle of nowhere became an apartment complex instead of some big financial firm surrounded by a city; (2) the time jump backwards was a little weird as well and then towards the end there's two ghosts and the ending was a little weird and confusing

At the beginning I thought the movie was going to be really good. It opens with the family videos and then goes to the bar all is well. The park scene happens and things start to go astray. What follows is one of the most awkward chase scenes I've ever witnessed (in which case they pin a police motorcycle between the two cars and even though he's wearing a mic it never dawns on him to radio for help apparently) and just when you thought that things couldn't get any worse, there's this awkward (way too long) stand off. The kidnapper of course gets away and causes a massive pileup to which in the time it takes the main character to catch up to the kidnapper apparently there's no first responders. Let's not mention she's driving a Chrysler van on about a 4th of gas tank and boy that van just becomes super fuel efficient out of nowhere (maybe its an unreleased hybrid model). I can't count how many times she should've been seriously injured - an airbag to the face, a car slamming into the side of the truck she was in and slamming her van into a tree but apparently Halle has reprieved part of her cat woman role and has 9 lives. It's ridiculous mixed with ridiculous topped with ridiculous with a side of ridiculous.

I like a good suspense-thriller/horror movie as much as the next person, but I'm tired of film- makers using stupidity as a substitute for good, old-fashioned writing and on-screen execution. I didn't even make it half-way thru this film before I turned it off out of frustration because you can only watch someone do so many dumb things before you just lose it. Instead of instilling fear and making you want to pull for the people's survival, I find myself thinking "Wow, really? That's what you're gonna do" and rooting for the bear. For example when the bear attacks the couple in the tent and the bear is just mauling away at her boyfriend. She literally just sits there and when she decides to run...she runs TOWARDS the damn bear to...WHAT?! Go check on whats left of her boyfriend? Ask the bear if he needs anything? Maybe a glass of water or a toothpick? Or maybe she was sacrificing herself as a dessert? I'd love to see one of these survival films with real-life simulation to it.