A Quiet Place is a truly remarkable feat — an original, tender yet terrifying horror
While it may sound like a Stephen King monster flick, this horror/thriller has more in common with films like I Am Legend or M. Night Shyamalan’s Signs
AN original horror/thriller is difficult to come by these days. But good grief, this is just about the most original and scariest horror in years.
Where most horrors go for gore or “behind you” tactics, A Quiet Place flips the genre on its head and turns the simplest of acts (walking, sneezing) into the equivalent of cherry-knocking at Freddy Krueger’s house.
A character accidentally dropping an item on to the floor nearly caused me to accidentally lose my breakfast.
We are at some point in the very near future, with an unspecified event irredeemably changing the planet.
Evil beings have all but wiped out humanity and taken over, leaving pockets of humans fighting for survival in the most difficult of circumstances.
The roaming creatures are completely blind, yet have the kind of acute hearing only found in parents listening out for a teenager’s 2am return home.
Evelyn (Emily Blunt) and Lee (John Krasinski), fresh from their own tragedy, must do whatever it takes to protect their kids.
In this case, that means complete and utter silence — for ever.
The family are incredibly self-sufficient and adept at hiding sound, whether it’s pouring sand along every path their bare feet touch, or hiding behind waterfalls to whisper to each other.
We follow them through their daily routine until, inevitably, things start unfolding in a horrible and disturbing way.
There is a moment when Evelyn’s imminent predicament dawns on you. She’s heavily pregnant.
The thought of a newborn baby entering a world reliant on complete silence is chilling and you really don’t want to see it played out.
When it does, you are witness to one of the most harrowing and tense moments of cinema I can remember.
Top all this with one child constantly crippled with fear and another profoundly deaf, unable to tell if she’s making any noise, and this exposition grips you from the devastating start to its unsettling finish.
While I might have painted the picture as a Stephen King monster flick, this really isn’t the case.
It has far more in common with something like I Am Legend or M. Night Shyamalan’s Signs.
Krasinski does an exemplary job in both the director’s chair and as a father desperately holding his family together through sheer love.
Sure, the scares are there. But where Krasinski sets this film apart is making us care for the protagonists. Most horrors leave you trying to second-guess which characters make it to the end.
Here, we really want all of them to survive.
I was willing them to pull through against all the odds.
The scares and dread will lure you in but this is also a remarkably affectionate film about family.
It’s not surprising that the real-life husband and wife show such chemistry (a dance to Neil Young via a shared iPod is beautiful) and such a profound need to protect their kids.
But the casting of the children is spot on.
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Noah Jupe as Marcus is terrific. But, oh boy, Millicent Simmonds, who plays Regan, is mind-blowing.
She is deaf in real life and her incredible expression dazzles you — just about stealing the show in a very packed race.
This film is a truly remarkable feat — an original, tender yet terrifying horror.
And you will never look at an upturned nail the same way again.
A QUIET PLACE
(15) 90mins
★★★★★