It Comes At Night (2017, Trey Edward Shults) - 0/10
When I finished this I actually felt like I should have kept watching Ridiculous 6 or Men in Tights. It was that unsatisfying. And in a way it's worse than those other films because it took 90 minutes of my life to be unsatisfying. At first it draws you in with this mystery of "what's out there", and we watch our characters as they take precautions against what might be in the air, what might come crashing through a window, what might come at night. As the film progresses there are vague hints about "it". A disease? A monster? You can't say for sure. You see some symptoms of it in the people it affects, or the animals, but it feels to be a small glimpse of a bigger thing. It's clear that the film is not about what "it" is, it could be any number of apocalyptic scenarios, it's about this particular group of characters reacting. Now for the record let me say I absolutely hate that. If the film is making that point, the point that "the thing" is irrelevant, I hate that point. Why is that a good point to make? What is the value in deliberately subtracting "the thing" as an ingredient here? How is that a betterment to the experience? We are forced to only focus on the characters and their reactions? There is no satisfactory answer to this for me. I could have the director beside me to answer this question, and it could be the best answer I've ever heard, but the experience was what it was. Half a film. The worst part is that it's deliberately half a film. It's not an ambitious film that was only half successful, it's a film that's successful at only because half a film. It's so stupid to me because it's very well made half a film. "Look how ugly people are when push comes to shove". So what. That may be true, but it is not revelatory and it is not exciting. It's just a fact of human nature. The film is like a game of horror charades, and you never can guess the answer, and when it's over nobody can tell you. It was just characters acting "something" out.
Tension, tension, tension, tension, film ends.
I might be out to lunch... a dumb conventional viewer who likes dumb conventional things. But honestly this feels like a film which dares a critic to dislike it. "The film lacks a villain" "You're missing the point you uncultured dolt!" The only dolt I found who when against this film was Mick LaSalle of SF Gate.
Awful. Perhaps the most awful thing I've seen from 2017. The more I think about it and write about it the more I hate it. It's not the worst film. It's the worst kind of film.