Friday, August 26, 2016

Don't Breathe - Movie Review: Haven't these Thieves seen Daredevil??





While Holding Breath Voice over (What you expected some witty repartee?)

Don’t Breathe starring Stephen Lang, Jane Levy, Dylan Minnette, Daniel Zovatto, and directed by Fede Alvarez. The film tells the story of a group of petty thieves who decide to break in and rob a blind army vet. What they don’t count on is how quickly the table turns once they enter his domain.

Don’t Breathe is a good suspense horror thriller. It is well shot and keeps you on the edge of your seat most of the movie. Alvarez does a great job of setting the tone of the film. Once the the tension and action starts it doesn’t let up until the end of the movie.. I was very impressed with the suspension filled sequences which left me guessing what was actually going to happen.

The movie does a great job of leaving you guessing. I didn’t see many of the twist and turns that happened throughout the course of the film. Granted this isn’t my typical genre of movie I usually go see, but I was intrigued by the premise of the story. Seeing Stephen Lange play a bad ass blind man who quickly starts hunting the people robbing him was enough to get me in the theatre.

Stephen Lang is awesome as the terror throughout the film. You easily believe he is capable of everything he does. Even the crazy wackiness the story brings out in the third act seems to fit the character he is portraying. He was the best part of the film and tied everything together. Without him being as terrifying as he was the movie wouldn’t have been nearly as suspenseful.

The other actors are fine in the movie, but they don’t really stand out.  Jane Levy is good as the main female lead and Dylan Minette is fine as nerdy friend.  They serve their purpose for the film, being terrified by Stephen Lange. Both actors do a great job in selling this fact.

The issue comes in with the other emotions and story the film tries to tell. I didn’t buy Jane Levy as a concerned young mother who just needs the next score to make everything right. You never really understands Minette’s characters motivations other than he is just trying to impress Levy’s character. It’s never explained why he has decided on a life of crime. They make him out to be the smart one, but if he is smart there needed to be another reason as to why he is helping commit the crimes.

Which is my other gripe for the movie, the premise as to why they rob the blind man didn’t make sense to me. They know the guy has money, but they never explain why they think he keeps his money in his house. Most people I know don’t stash away large sums of cash in their house anymore. They usually keep it in a bank. I needed some story reason as to why they thought the money was in his house rather than at his local Bank of America. 

This story gripe quickly drops away when the suspense ratchets up. The movie was made to scare the audience by building suspense, and the film does this extremely well. Some of the scenarios where a tad contrived and forced into being suspenseful by convenance of the story. The setup still works extremely well and I can give the film a pass on this. I also liked the fact I never knew if someone was going to make it out of their situation.  There are some clever twists I wasn’t expecting in the movie.  This being said I did think there were one to many ending scenarios. I could have gone with just one less, because the last event seemed unnecessary for how the movie ended overall.

Don't Breathe is a well-made fun suspense thriller. If you haven’t seen trailers for the film don't watch them and go in cold. There are a few scenes the trailers reveal which would have worked more if discovered in the movie. If you enjoy a good suspense horror this is a must see. If you are like me and don’t usually go to horror films, I still think this is one worth checking out. It’s not straight horror, but tension building and suspenseful.


Have you seen Don’t Breath? If you have what did you think. If you haven’t let me know your favorite home invasion movie in the comments. Like share subscribe and all that fun stuff. Thanks for watching. 

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