Don’t Breath 2016 A Quick Review

Don’t Breath 2016 A Quick Review

Don’t Breath 2016 A Quick Review

Don't Breathe Blu-ray Cover

In Don’t Breathe, three college aged burglars decided to break into a blind Vietnam veteran’s home for an easy score but soon discover, there’s nothing about it that is going to be easy.

When I first saw the trailer for Don’t Breathe, I wasn’t that excited to see it. It didn’t look like a horror movie to me, though that’s what it was being sold as. It began to get good reviews and I still wasn’t too interested in seeing it. Then my son saw it with his wife and they enjoyed it. Said it was pretty good. My son isn’t the horror movie fan that I am. My daughter and I share the love of the genre but my son just never got into them. I didn’t know what to think about him liking it. I started to become more interested in it. I ordered the Blu-ray from Amazon, and here we are.

I watched it last night. I was about 20 minutes into watching the Pro Bowl competitions before the game and decided to pause that and watch this instead. I am glad I did. Turns out that I was right in the fact that it isn’t really a horror movie. It’s got a shit-ton of suspense. Don’t Breathe is the perfect title for this film. “Butt Pucker The Movie” might be another title they could have gone with it because there was a whole lot that happening as I watched it. I haven’t seen anything this suspenseful since Silence of the Lambs. In fact, this is more in line with that type of movie than actual horror movies. But, it is what it is as it and I highly recommend Don’t Breathe.

Don't Breathe's Dylan Minnette and Stephen Lang in the hallway.

It starts off almost boring. It tries to add some depth to the two main characters and I wasn’t buying it. Jane Levy’s character Rocky plays a stereo-typical messed up teen/early 20 something from a stereo-typical white trash home. She gives a little speech to the other main character Alex, played by Dylan Minnette. It was all about her father leaving and how horrible her mother is. Her acting wasn’t the problem. She was terrific. The problem was that the film is trying to make me like her. We’ve already seen her break into a house and damage it for no reason as they went along with the burglary. So, I was like, here’s the part where they try to humanize these unlikable people. It didn’t make me give a shit about her character. At least it didn’t at first.

At the beginning of her little speech in the car while casing their next house to burglarize, I saw what she was doing. She wasn’t sharing her past with Alex because she cared about him. She was just telling a story to manipulate him. There was something she wanted from him and she was just using her past as tool to get what she wanted. As the story she told went on, it started to work on me a little. I started to soften, a little towards her. This was more about the writer than the actress. This was brilliantly written. I think what started out as manipulation turned into something deeper as the character continues to tell her story. It was very well written and acted.

I need to digress for a moment here and talk about Jane Levy. I’ve seen her in two films now. I recognized her name when they movie started but I didn’t recognize her until about 20 minutes into the film. She was the brunette lead in Evil Dead. She gave a hint of a look that I saw her give in the Evil Dead remake. She looked so different then. That level character acting amazes me. Some of the biggest stars are pretty much the same person in every movie. Stallone is basically, Stallone in every single movie he does. You know it’s Stallone. You know it’s Schwarzenegger. You know it’s Sean Connery. There’s nothing wrong with that. They are great at what they do. But, in my opinion, the best actors are the ones that can go from role to role and are almost unrecognizable. They seemed to just blend into the character they are portraying. It appears that Jane Levy is that good. I truly look forward to seeing her again. I just hope she doesn’t turn her back on the genre.

Don't Breathe's Jane Levy Crawling Through an Air Shaft

Come out to the coast, we’ll get together, have a few laughs…

Everyone’s performance in Don’t Breathe was good. Stephen “Look at those fucking guns” Lang was amazing in this. Dylan Minette as Alex, the stuck in the friendzone, friend of Rocky was also really well played. Then there was Dylan Zovatto who played Money, the 3rd person in the trio of burglars. I instantly didn’t like his character. I know people like him, I don’t like people him. I don’t care that deep down he may have a heart. I just can’t stand dipshits like him. The funny thing about that was seeing the special features. Dylan is nothing like the character he played. In real life, he looks like a 14-year-old. A really nice guy, it seems. Nothing like he’s douchey character. It was a pleasant surprise to see that he too wasn’t just being himself more or less but was actually acting. Becoming someone he is not. All around great acting in Don’t Breathe.

There’s not really any gore to speak of in Don’t Breathe. It’s not really needed and I should admit that it’s not really needed. This movie has so many other things going for it. I’ve already mentioned the suspense and the acting. But, the most surprising thing about Don’t Breathe to me were the twists and turns. You wouldn’t think going into this movie that there would any real twists. I mean, most of the movie takes place inside a two-story house with a basement. Going into this film, I wondered how they were going to make this movie last 88 minutes. Well, they did a great job of keeping it interesting. And, they did it without pissing the audience off. None of the character’s do anything terribly stupid.

If you’re looking for a good “horror” movie, checkout Don’t Breathe. Suspense, twists and turns, great acting, a lovable dog and a Turkey Baster. What more could anyone ask for?

Watch the Trailer

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Recommend

Into the Grizzly Maze 2014

Into the Grizzly Maze 2014

Grizzly aka Red Machine aka Into the Grizzly Maze 2014

Grizzly 2014Two estranged brothers reunite at their childhood home in the Alaskan wild. They set out on a two-day hike and are stalked by an unrelenting grizzly bear.” – Wikipedia

There is a crapload of star power in this movie and yet it fails on so many levels.  Here’s a few that stand out to me.

First off, it’s rated PG-13.  This says to me that the plan is to have a “Monster” type movie that a younger audience can go see.  Here’s there problem with this theory.  The cast is made up mostly well known actors in their 30’s or older.   Younger audiences aren’t going to really know or care about the casting so they should have gone for an R rating and added some real gore and suspense to the film.

Second on the fail list.  No real gore.  Most of the bear attacks happen off camera.  So most what little gore we do get to see is after the attack and there’s no excitement to it.  When you have a movie that is about a bear attacking and you almost never see it actually attack anyone the movie has failed.  It’s a lot like Japanese porn.  Just when it starts to get good they blur everything out.  What’s that all about?!

Third thing making this a bad horror movie is that the lack of suspense is frustratingly apparent.  It’s almost non-existent.  I think it goes back to the PG-13 thing.  It’s like they didn’t want it to be too intense for younger viewers.  So, all the people that really want to see it, the fans of the great actors in the movie, have nothing to enjoy about the film.

Grizzly 2014 No Reason To Stay In The Cabin

No, we’re not going to secure the cabin. We’re going to keep walking around in the dark while the bear stalks us and our friend bleeds out from her wound.

Fourth thing.  Characters doing stupid things.  You have hunters with rifles that can’t shoot a bear running, even with multiple shots.  I mean these guys are using rifles.  Rifles are terribly accurate weapons.  Everybody misses when shooting at the bear.  Then there’s that time when they decide not to stay in the abandoned cabin over night with the bear stalking them.  They think it’s a much better idea to stay out in the open and fucking talk a lot.

To sum it all up, this movie is about a huge Grizzly that is killing people out of rage for the way it’s kind has been wronged.  But, we rarely see the bear actually kill anyone.   We never really get to see any gore and there’s almost no suspense at all.  As an “Animal Attacks” movie it couldn’t have failed more.  Seriously, most of the “bear attacks” are completely circumstantial.  If this movie was a court room drama, the bear would totally be acquitted.

Now, there are some good things that sadly don’t really help the movie any but here they are.  The acting of course is pretty decent.  Though it seems like the actors at times give off a “WTF am doing in this movie” vibe.  There is some emotional depth to the characters and storylines.  But, they play out more like a movie of the week instead.  It would have totally worked had the filmmakers thrown in some actual bear attack scenes and suspense for grown ups and forgot about the PG-13 rating.

Grizzly 2014 Star Power Fail

Forgive me but I have to rant about this PG-13 vs R rating thing for a moment.  I don’t have a problem with films of any rating.  What I do have problems with is when filmmakers try to make something fit into a format it shouldn’t.  This movie is sold as a bear attack film first.  So much so, it’s titled “Grizzly”.  Had it been titled, “The Bear That Cared Too Much” I would expect a PG-13 rating or less.  But, that isn’t the case.  This is a movie about a bear attacking and killing people.  Had the filmmakers not sugar coated the violence but instead went with it.  This film could have been really good and much more exciting.

I guess an easier way to explain what I mean is by bringing up John Ashcroft, the former U.S. Attorney General under President George Bush Jr.  He had issues with nudity.  For him nudity wasn’t even acceptable in art form.  He was constantly being photographed and filmed in front of statues that showed male and female nudie bits.  He didn’t like that.  So he famously or more to the point idiotically covered the “Spirit of Justice statues”.  This is kinda like what this movie did.  Instead of following the natural direction the film should take it compromised the films integrity so that it would fit into particular MPAA rating.  At least that’s my theory.  I could be wrong.  It could be that the film is really just that bad and there is no excuse.

Cast of Characters:
James Marsden as Rowan
Thomas Jane as Beckett
Billy Bob Thornton as Douglas
Piper Perabo as Michelle
Scott Glenn as Sully
Adam Beach as Johnny Cadillac
Michaela McManus as Kaley
Kelly Curran as Amber
Bart the Bear as Red Machine
Luisa D’Oliveira as Zoe Langford
Carson Reaume as young Rowan
Seth Isaac Johnson as Young Beckett
Patrick Sabongui as Marcus
Sarah Desjardins as Sydnee
Sean O. Roberts as Franco
Reese Alexander as Gerry Smith