A relentless horror film that lives up to its title, Fede Alvarez's Don't Breathe is an intense, gripping genre exercise which makes the best of its "trapped in a psychopath's home" story structure, delivering a highly enjoyable horror experience that delivers on both brooding atmosphere and subversive storytelling. Don't Breathe is centered around Rocky, a young woman living in a decaying area of Detroit, who wants nothing more than to start a better life for her and her sister in California. With the help of her friend Alex, who secretly harbors feelings for her, and Money, Rocky's simple-minded boyfriend, the group decides to rob the house of a blind man, an ex-military man who lives in a home that is utterly secluded, alone in a crumbling suburb of Detroit. Expecting a rather simple cash grab, the group soon finds they are in for a fight for their lives, when the blind man living in the home turns out to be a deeply deranged man whose life of seclusion and sorrow, due to the death of his daughter, has left him in a state of angst and potential vengeance. From the very outset of Don't Breathe it's clear that the film is intent on creating a chilling, expressionistic experience, with Fede Alvarez injecting the film with a foreboding cinematic style full of creeping camera movements and eerie sound design. Featuring a simple, straight-forward narrative that does provide a few subversive twists that I won't detail here, Don't Breathe is a rewarding genre exercise due to Alvarez's command of atmosphere and pacing. Much like Mike Flanagan's Hush early this year, Don't Breathe takes advantage of its unique attribute, the deaf antagonist, delivering unique horror set-pieces, thrills, and chills, with sound design and observational camera work creating a very intense, gripping experience that left me holding my breath from start to finish. Fede Alvarez's Don't Breathe has a great sense of escalation too, with the film becoming increasingly intense, brutal, and subversive as it continues, delivering an experience that never lets up and leaves the viewer themselves breathless (pun intended) due to the sheer horror of what these character's must overcome in order to survive. The low body count in Don't Breathe may sound like a detriment to some of the more blood-thirsty fans of the horror genre, but what Don't Breathe lacks in overall body count, it more than makes up in brutality and subversive concepts, delivering a horror film in which life feels precious and the extermination of it feels deeply felt. A film that understands the importance of mood and atmosphere first, Fede Alvarez's Don't Breathe is a brutal, intense, and relentless genre exercise that is sure to leave most viewers at the edge of their seats from start to finish.
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AuthorLove of all things cinema brought me here. Archives
June 2023
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