What's The Movie About?
Two lovers get stranded in the woods, and they tormented by three masked killers.
What I Like.
There's a scene where the two leads have a heart-to-heart and a couple little moments where they have actual concern for each other and it was very sweet. This movie is also the first time I've heard the song Nights In White Satin by The Moody Blues, and I enjoy that song. I did get a kick at listing every innocuous thing the couple did being the reason that they were going to be killed, and I thought the proposal scene at the end was funny. Both of those things were not intentional on the part of the filmmakers, true, but I'll give the movie credit for it anyway because it's not getting a lot otherwise.
What I Didn't Like.
This movie is not only a checklist of things I don't like about slasher movies, but it also has a cadre of interesting new problems that make it a real slog to watch. I'm gonna split this section into two parts, so let's. Get! CRACKIN'!
First, what I don't like about slashers. I don't think they are scary. At all. I get the idea of a man in a mask with a knife is much more realistic than a ghost or monster, but not only do I think a threat that you can't quite comprehend because it wasn't even believed to EXIST until a few seconds ago is more scary than said man in mask, but it's also more interesting. Plus half the time these movies want us to sympathize with the killer, or at least be happy when the butcher up the ANNOYING AS HELL CHARACTERS. Yes, of course I'm happy to see an annoying character get killed. But I so much would prefer to have enjoyable to watch personalities try to solve a situation, and get sad then they fail and inevitably die. It also doesn't help that all the character are stupid in slashers movies. It's hard to feel sympathy when some dies if it's entirely their own fault. (Also, a lot of slasher have bizarrely puritan ethics. The joke that if you have sex in a horror movie you'll be the first to die is well known, but it also extends to smoking marijuana and the most grievous sin of not being white. Either way, you commit one "sin" and you're next to be on Chuck the Choppin' Man's chopping block. It's really fucked if you think about actually.) And if I don't feel sympathy for the victim of a murder, I don't get scared in the slightest. This, in my opinion, is the biggest way a horror movie can fail. It's not a death knell, I have recommended horror movies that I thought weren't scary. But I always recommend it on the creativity of the film, and/or the fun/spectacle of the violence. And well...
The Strangers fails itself beyond my issue with slashers, mostly because it lack some very important aspects. The first thing it lacks is fun or interesting violence. There are two main, non-killer (kind of) characters. So they are not going to get picked off one by one. Even when they eventually do get killed, it's by a stab to the gut. You know, the most boring way to get murdered. The film is rated R too, so I don't know why they are so coy with the gore. The masked killers of the film spend most of the time just messing around, which leads me to the next thing this movie lacks, any semblance of character intelligence. It's not just the victims in the Strangers, everyone is really fucking dumb. There are several moments where the killers have a perfect opportunity to kill one or both of the victims, but instead just decide to stare at them. Or the camera will pan past something and they're gone. Just like Batman oOoOoOoOh~. Roan, clearly the killers are trying to mess with their victims. It's probably part of their motivation. Well Buggnutz, not only does half of the 'messing with their victims' go completely unnoticed by said victims, but you just hit the final and biggest aspect that this film is lacking. The Strangers: Chapter 1 lacks context, specifically about the killers. They purposefully did not give the killers any motivation. What they were trying to go for was invoking the horror of random crimes, the (please read the following two words with the thickest sarcasm imaginable) incredibly classy intro makes that clear. But here's the thing. Random violent crimes still have a motive behind them. Sometimes it's an accident, sometimes it's an addition to a robbery, and sometimes it's just because the perpetrator has a mental illness, but it's still a motive. Additionally, fiction has different rules than reality. When you are telling a story, there are certain rules you must follow otherwise it just, objectively, is a bad story. One of those rules is that characters must have a motivation. (Honestly, I think I don't even need to make a distinction between fiction and reality in this instance, but this isn't the place to discuss Nihilism versus Existentialism.) So the movie lacks spectacle, sense, and context. Leaving nothing but boring, nonsensical scenes.
I have one last complaint, which is not only pretty petty, but I also didn't know what section to put it under. So... I hate the dialogue in this movie. It's very quippy. Which I normally have no problem with at all, but it just generally sucks and I was begging for the couple to stop talking to each other entirely. Which is a bit of a shame, because when it felt like they weren't just being smug at each other they had some pretty good chemistry.
Final Summation.
Apparently this is gonna be a trilogy. Great. Next one's supposed to come out in October, so if I'm still doing this watch-everything-that-comes-out thing then I'll of course watch it. But I'm not looking forward to it. Please give the killers a motivation next time.
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