The magnitude of adrenaline rush and immense tension felt while seeing this film has left me longing to watch it again. The Uruguayan filmmaker, Fede Alvarez, won me over by his originality and profound imagination, which has left me mesmerised by this thriller and horror movie. What makes this film stand out the most is that it really emphasises and reinforces the ideology that danger can lurk anywhere – even from those who are blind.
This small budget film grossed $107 million as an international total as of 18 September 2016 and has become a prosperous movie. Alvarez mentioned in an interview that there was a lot of focus that went into the sound design, which paid off hugely because you can hear every single bone crack, floorboard creak, and breath. The film doesn’t contain as much bloodshed and violence and centres more on the tension, whereas in his previous debut film, Evil Dead, there was too much goriness.
The story centres around three reckless individuals who make a living by breaking and entering into the houses of wealthy people. After finding out that an army veteran is living with $300,000 in cash stashed somewhere, the three of them break into his house in search for it. The task, as you can imagine, doesn’t quite go as planned.
Money (Daniel Zovatto) is a juvenile and rash character whose personality is really provocative. Zovatto did a great job is showing how incompetent and malicious Money is. Money’s ignorance is stressed even more when he calls Rocky (Jane Levy) “his bitch.” In contrast, Alex (Dylan Minnette) has a more rational and methodical approach to everything. Rocky is a naïve character and her only motive in doing this is because she wants to escape to California with her little sister and leave her careless mother and her boyfriend.
There is an abundance of intense scenes in this movie and the suspense will leave hairs standing on the back of your neck for weeks. Stephen Lang (who has also been in the film Avatar) was really impressive. It was completely gobsmacking how accurately he was able to portray the eeriness of his character, simply credited as The Blind Man.
Essentially, if you are looking for an overwhelmingly exciting and unnerving movie, this is the one for you.
Don’t Breathe is on general release now.
Don’t Breathe trailer
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