It Comes at Night

This movie doesn't fail to scare; worse, it blatantly doesn't even try.

I don't know if I'm more disappointed by movies that you can tell will be crap just by looking at the lighting and camera-work, or a movie that's actually pretty decent in terms of techy stuff and casting and acting and atmosphere and yet miserably fails to deliver. Yeah I think it's the latter. At least with cheap looking movies you know the risk.

If you look at this as a movie that explores "the human condition" or something like that, you might find some merit in it. However, it's advertised as a horror movie, which, by definition, needs to at least TRY to scare audiences. Such a disappointment.

All in all I'm just left wondering what the critics must have watched to give this such high scores. I'll think twice in the future before I watch something trusting Joel Edgerton's name.

An incredibly poor attempt at being mysterious that leaves questions unanswered and answers vague. A movie that leads viewers to form their own ending does not give me the idea of effort and creativity but a lack there of. Any sort of plotline or point of interest was mentioned once and then never again. They didn't follow through on anything. There was nothing to be afraid of because we were never told what to be afraid of. What comes at night? What is the disease and how do you get it? The characters got no development, the story got no development, it was all very surface level.

Cinematography was good though.

It takes a lot for me to dislike a film. It has to be a complete and utter waste of my time, and even then it could still have some redeeming values. Its hard to label It Comes at Night. On one hand, its a slow paced descent into the deepest throes of the human psyche, and on the other hand it is an utterly depressing and hopeless look at humanity.

I tend to lean on the latter part of my assessment, mainly because there is just so much reality to this parable about a world ravaged by a deadly virus (yeesh, imagine if this came out in 2020). More than anything, this film pretty much predicted what could happen if a disease truly did start randomly killing people with no quarter. Society would turn on itself, and it would become a battle of the fittest and prepared, and in some cases, best armed. I don't fault anyone for not liking this film. It's a hard slog and a depressing one at that. I appreciate the fact the film didn't try to sugarcoat anything. I truly believe humanity would turn on each other in a similar way.

Is the movie well made? Sure, I had no problems with the pacing or the reality of the story. Beyond that, there is not much else to say about this film. It's a simple survival story and every person's opinion of it hinges on whether they believe humanity is ultimately selfish (much like myself) or you were looking for a standard horror/thriller that would try holding a mirror up and asking what you would do in that situation.

I must confess I was expecting way more of this "horror" film.

It started off quite well (hence the 4 rating) but after the first 30 minutes went downhill. No questions were answered, you are left with a large list of plot holes and an ending that couldn't be more predictable and boring.

Don't get me wrong, it isn't the worst "horror" film I ever saw but is avoidable especially if you like HORROR.

I'm still waiting for what comes at night.

I am a fan of post-apocalyptic movies and for the first 20 minutes this film shows promise, good visuals and mood. But then it crawls repeating the same shots and mild shocks until after the hour mark. At this stage you are left wondering when the real story is going to start. Plot elements are started but then abandoned. A little mystery is a good idea in this genre, it heightens the fear but at some point you need an actual narrative to draw it all together.

The ending did force a climax but it seemed botched somewhat by the director so you are left wondering exactly what happened.

The biggest failing is I didn't feel interested enough in the characters to care enough about them during the attempted resolution.

I understand that the budget would have been small but that is no excuse. The camera work was fine. The frights were well done and the tension was well maintained but it gets boring when repeated. The actors did a good job though some were miscast. It was the writing and direction that let the story down.

For a better example of a post apocalyptic movie with a similar setting look at One Hundred Mornings.