A Quiet Place
The name says it all. In the post-apocalyptic world of A Quiet Place, where mysterious, blind creatures hunt by sound, even the slightest pin drops have the capacity to grip the audience with horrific suspense. Director, writer, and star John Krasinski — best known for playing Jim from The Office — masterfully uses both silence and sound to lure in and shock the audience. The product is simultaneously intense and unnerving, and while it does little to deviate from the conventional tropes of similar movies (think Don’t Breathe, or even Alien), A Quiet Place still stands out — if not for its skillful execution, then for its fundamental humanity.
The movie begins with the words “Day 89.” The signpost is a familiar but effective post-apocalyptic trope, intriguing enough to make one ask, “Day 89 of what?” The audience holds its breath as it watches the Abbott family — mom, dad, and three kids — silently rummage for supplies in an abandoned town. A sense of danger hangs in the air, though none of us are quite sure what the danger is. Small, portent clues signal impending doom: missing posters, an urgent finger to the lips, the smallest child grabbing the batteries for his toy rocket off the table. As the family heads home, a sickly Marcus (Noah Jupe) looks over the shoulder of his father, Lee (John Krasinski), eyes widening at what is to be the first horror of the film: Beau (Cade Woodward) — the youngest — has turned on the toy rocket. Its beeping fills the air, rupturing the silence. Lee desperately sprints towards the boy, but he’s too late. In these first few minutes, we are quickly clued in to Krasinski’s clever devices: the sparsity of information forces us to lean into the silence, to pay attention to the minutiae of gestures, facial expressions, and background clues. At the same time, the film’s quietness allows its jump-scares to leap off the screen with especially shocking effect.
Fast forward several hundred days, and the Abbotts have been resourceful enough to form a safe house in the countryside. The film shines here in its portrayals of the family’s everyday routines. Watching the Abbotts build a semblance of home despite the constant threat of death is a treat, and a testament to the resistance of hope amidst fear. Lee’s wife, Evelyn (Emily Blunt), is heavily pregnant, and is busy readying the family for the new addition. Millicent Simmonds is remarkable as Regan, the Abbotts’ deaf daughter, who struggles to navigate her guilt over (spoiler alert) Beau’s death alongside her coming-of-age frustrations. The little sounds speak volumes; they form little pockets of intimacy in a movie otherwise characterized by dread. One special moment shows Lee and Evelyn slow-dancing in their basement, sharing one pair of earphones, allowing their anxieties to be drowned out — if only momentarily — by Neil Young’s languid music.
The movie is by no means perfect. The plot is anaemic, and it’s a good thing there isn’t much dialogue, because what there is is cringe-worthy. More than once, the script lapses into saccharine family-sacrifice gimmicks. It’s also a horror movie that falls victim to some of the worst tendencies of its genre, i.e., having characters make senseless and avoidable decisions while we exasperatedly yell “Why would anyone do that?” at the screen. Characters somehow survive despite breathing far too loudly. And the creatures hunting them are totally inconsistent — at times absurdly fast and stealthy, and at others, slow and clumsy. Yet A Quiet Place is still an exhilarating journey, largely thanks to Krasinski’s ability to build investment in his characters. The audience genuinely wants the Abbotts to survive, and when things start to go wrong, the trepidation is unbearable.
For much of the film, the tension is palpable. Characters are catapulted from one stressful situation to another, escaping by a mere hair’s breadth at each juncture. The movie is relentlessly frightening, in no small part due to Charlotte Christensen’s excellent cinematography, which seamlessly transports audiences from wide expanses of farmland — beautiful landscapes in the sunlight, disorienting hunting grounds at night — to the claustrophobic terror of narrow corridors and bathtubs. The ending is at once heart-warming and satisfying, a rare feat for any movie in its genre. Perhaps the highest praise I can give A Quiet Place is that it’s a good movie, not just “good for a horror movie.”
