BEFORE: OK, this is the last horror-themed film that I'm planning to watch, I promise, at least until October finally rolls around - again, the problem with putting THIS film THERE was that it didn't link up with anything else on the docket, so that would break the chain for sure. This film has so few actors in it that I either had to watch it between two John Krasinski films - and I missed that opportunity in January, between "Promised Land" and "13 Hours", or here, between two films with Emily Blunt, who carries over from "Sherlock Gnomes".
"A Quiet Place" could be like this year's "Get Out", another film that it felt like everyone had seen and was talking about, and I was the last one to watch it, just because I was waiting for my chain to have a slot for it. But then, of course, it's almost too late for me because I've heard so much about the film from other people and the media that I already know the hook. Well, at least I get to see all the superhero films when they open, I can be among to first to see SOME movies, if not every movie. Horror's not really my genre, anyway, so I just have to take the surprises when they come.
Speaking of which, SPOILER ALERT tonight if you've waited even longer than I did to watch this one. If you haven't seen this, I won't fault you for moving along.
THE PLOT: In a post-apocalyptic world, a family is forced to live in silence while hiding from monsters with ultra-sensitive hearing.
AFTER: OK, really this is a very clever film, let me get that right out of the way. The two basic elements of filmmaking are sight and sound, and to come up with a new approach to how one of those (sound, obvi) is used is ground-breaking, no matter how you slice it. Yes, there are monsters, no secret there, because that's the "they" on the poster, and it's also right there in the synopsis. What kind of monsters? The kind that can HEAR you really well, that's how they locate their prey and how they track it, from the noise it makes. So clearly all of society collapsed once the monsters arrive, because come on, how many people do you know that are good at keeping quiet? Everywhere we go these days, somebody is always TALKING, even if they're not saying anything worth hearing. We're all on our phones, or listening to podcasts, or watching TV, screening films - even when we're riding on trains or planes, God forbid anybody sit in silence any more, or read a book, or meditate, or even have five minutes of silence to think about their goals and dreams. There's no time, because there are phone calls to make or someone on the subway needs to talk about what happened at work - usually it's the person next to me, and they're doing it very loudly, and they overuse the words "basically" and "actually" in every god-damned sentence.
So I don't know if these monsters come from space, or from deep within the bowels of the earth, or they were grown in a lab - it doesn't matter. I welcome our new monster overlords, because they're going to thin the herd of all the LOUD people. Doesn't that sound nice? Kids make a LOT of noise - teens, too, and adult hipsters are all yap yap yap - so I'm trying to look at the upside here. Unlike the xenomorphs in "Alien", who eat everyone they see, these monsters need to HEAR you in order to be able to find you. SO the Abbott family not only lives out in the middle of nowhere, they've developed a lot of techniques to be able to survive. They may have had an advantage because their daughter is deaf, so they already knew sign language - that's probably part of the reason they're still around, and for all they know, there could be very few other humans left. Once the monsters ate all the loud people in the cities, then they must have started coming for the ones out in the country.
But having a deaf daughter turns out to be a double-edged sword - Regan doesn't speak, so that's a good thing - but she could be making noise in other ways, and not be aware of that. Or she wouldn't know to stay away from other things that ARE making noise, and that could easily be a problem, unless she can somehow sense their vibrations. Plus, the mother in the family is pregnant, and how is THAT going to work out, because the first natural instinct a baby has is to cry or make noise, and then it will probably continue to do that for several years. I just couldn't see how that could possibly end well - or any pregnancy for that matter, but I suppose that's a personal issue.
Among all the chaos of living out in the woods, potentially surrounded by dangerous ravenous creatures, there are still some tense personal family moments as the parents deal with normal teen issues, which are multiplied by guilt over a previous tragedy, and a general inability to discuss these things, which is further amplified by the inability of everyone to speak freely. Sure, arguments can be had in sign language, too, but it's not quite the same as people screaming at each other.
I've got some experience in going about my business quietly - my wife and I are generally on different sleeping schedules, largely due to this silly movie project, so I always have to be aware when I'm moving around the house about how much noise I'm generating. And lately I've taken to watching movies and TV with the closed-captioning turned on, because then I don't have to pump up the volume to a point where it wakes her up, and I also don't have to listen to lines of dialogue several times to determine what was said. Yeah, I need to get back to see an ear doctor, because my attempt last year to get a hearing aid didn't pan out - I ended up in the office of a hearing aid specialist who told me that the best ones in the world come from Norway, and cost about $3,000 - none of which would be covered by our health insurance. So maybe I can get a domestic one somewhere else that will suit my needs, and my wallet, a little better.
But of course, when you're trying to get around your house quietly, and not wake someone up, OF COURSE that's when you're going to stub your toe, or knock over a stack of books or something, or step on the cat's tail. This can be very comic, unless of course there are monsters out in the cornfield just waiting for a sonic clue to your location. Also, I've noticed that when people feel pain, they scream louder when there are other people around. Humans have developed the practice of saying "Ouch" over time, mainly to let others know that we're in pain - I've fallen down so many times that I think I qualify as an expert on the subject, and I've found that when I'm by myself, I don't make any noise about it at all. Even if I'm dealing with a hangnail or a splinter, or I burn myself, what would be the point in saying "Ouch" if I'm by myself? I already know I'm feeling the pain, though I suppose there's some psychological benefit to screaming in pain, I make more noise when I get up from a chair in the office and my knees hurt, just because other people are there, and I want them to know about it. Otherwise, I generally keep my pain to myself, unless I've got a kidney stone or something.
Even then, I was in an ambulance once and I was making jokes with the EMT's. I was taken out of New York Comic-Con on a stretcher, once I realized that my back pain was really a kidney stone, and was getting more intense by the minute. The ambulance took me to St. Luke's, and as I was being checked in, one of the EMT's came back in from outside and told me that he saw how much sweat was on the stretcher, and he realized what my pain level probably was. I said, "Yeah, no shit!" but in a nice way, so that he ended up being impressed that I was telling jokes all the way to the hospital. I won't say that laughter is the best medicine, but it can help until you can get to an I.V. with some morphine. I guess I could have screamed all the way along on the ambulance ride, but what purpose would that have served?
I think it qualifies as a NITPICK POINT that it took so long for someone to figure out whether these monsters had a weakness, the movie sort of has to bend over backwards so that the audience can take a solid guess at it before the characters do, and then there's this dreadful delay when you might be just wondering what's taking so long for them to put two and two together. That's my only criticism, except that the monsters looked a bit too much like some seen on a certain Netflix series, one with much louder kids.
Also starring John Krasinski (last seen in "13 Hours"), Millicent Simmonds, Noah Jupe (last seen in "Suburbicon"), Cade Woodward, Leon Russom.
RATING: 6 out of 10 newspaper clippings
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