It Comes at Night

[RegularKarate]

Has anyone else seen this movie? I have opinions I would like to exchange.

[pete]

RK you've met the DP of this film when we all hung out in Austin that one time.

[RegularKarate]

RK you've met the DP of this film when we all hung out in Austin that one time.

Oh crazy! Well, he did a great job because the film looks amazing.
Actually, I'll say every did a great job. The movie is really well acted and well directed.
I just really wish there was more story there.

[pete]

yeah I see what you mean - spoilers

I think Christopher Abbot - one of my favorite actors - played his role too straight so the audience doesn't have a reason to suspect anything, making Paul and his wife's paranoia extremely unrelatable, which would've been fine if it weren't like the central thesis of the story and the main driver of the entire plot. also the wife's turn in third act was good - it made sense but was surprising - but it was hampered by her need to explain their rationale for shooting the new family twice in the same scene (ie. why they felt like they had to shoot the family who just wanted to leave) - that felt very clunky for a movie that was otherwise very lean, but unfortunately that was like what the whole movie was supposed to build up to. It could've led us into Blue Ruin territory, but it wasted valuable screen time repeating scenes and hallucination rather than building that doubt or raising stakes.

[RegularKarate]

That last sentence is exactly how I felt.
And Christopher Abbot really is great.

[modage]

Film looked great, great atmosphere, tension, performances, but agree there wasn't quite a movie there.

Also: A24 with the Fuck You bait-and-switch to general auds expecting a horror movie. Yikes, my theatre was not happy when this ended.

[jenkins]

there wasn't a single fucking surprise in the entire setup, and i had to slog through obvious feelings of dread. i wish i hadn't already known about the change of aspect ratios for dream sequences? that doesn't seem helpful to me. this entire movie annoyed me.