Rating: 2.5 Pulses
Liv Tyler, Scott Speedman, Glenn Howerton
Directed by Bryan Bertino
Rated R
Not to be confused with Albert Camus’ “The Stranger,” first-time writer/director Bryan Bertino’s new horror film The Strangers shares some existential elements with the aforementioned novel, albeit in a bleaker and less artful way.
Tyler and Speedman play Kristen and James, a couple on the verge of a break-up whose planned romantic weekend at a secluded summer home is ruined when, at 4 a.m., a stranger comes a-knockin’ on their door.
The pretty young blonde at their doorstep seems innocent enough except for her shadowy and vacant gaze. What proceeds is a 90-minute game of hide and seek that is full of sound and fury, signifying nothing.
There are parts of The Strangers that are truly unnerving. The scares, at first anyway, seem less intent on making you jump than making you squirm. This is effectively achieved when the masked malevolents stand creepily in the background, the victims unaware and unprotected in the forefront.
Unfortunately, this tactic gets quite old halfway through the film, and the viewer is left wondering why the strangers keep passing up so many opportunities to capture their prey. However, the killers aren’t the only ones prone to such inexplicable actions.
The major downfall of many a scary movie lies in the stupidity of the protagonists. Kristen and James seem to be the exception to this rule until the second act when they lose their shotgun to the axe and knife-wielding psycho stoics. The inanity reaches an apex when Glenn Howerton (of “It’s Always Sunny In Philadelphia”) shows up for a very short-lived and tragically ironic turn as James’ best friend.
Technically, the film is shot well with plenty of queasy hand-held close-ups to disorient the viewer and heighten the tension, and the use of a skipping record has rarely been so unsettling (and who knew Joanna Newsom could sound so eerie?), but the lack of any story developments leave the scares stale.
That the killers’ motives are rendered irrelevant, and the victims’ changes of heart in the face of death point to a message that we all create our own meaning, somehow, the movie never shakes the notion of the pointlessness of things, which I couldn’t help but apply to the time I spent watching this disappointment.
