Fear the Night

I had not heard about this movie from writer and director Neil LaBute priot to sitting down to watch it. So I really had no particular expectations to the movie. But I Will say that the movie's synopsis sounded interesting enough, plus the fact that the movie was starring Maggie Q certainly was a good selling point.

The storyline in "Fear the Night", however, turned out to be a rather bland and generic home invasion type of movie. Writer and director Neil LaBute didn't really bring much of anything new to the genre, and instead played it safe by cashing in on all the stereotypical tropes seen in the genre in many movies before this. But hey, at least there is a sense of security and familiarity in that aspect, I suppose.

The acting performances in "Fear the Night" were okay, and they had a good cast ensemble together for the movie, I will say that much. But the actors and actresses very given very little of anything substantial to work with.

If you're looking for a home invasion movie to watch, then I will say that there are better choices out there and more entertaining movies to be seen.

Watchable for what it was, "Fear the Night" is not a movie that made a lasting impression on me. And it is hardly a movie that warrants more than just a single viewing, because there isn't sufficient contents to the storyline to suuport more than just the first and only viewing.

My rating of "Fear the Night" lands on a very bland five out of ten stars.

I'm a fan of Maggie Q, and I feel bad for her that she had to be part of such a lame excuse for an action-thriller. Barely any of her action skills were utilized effectively. This film lacked a cohesive and engaging narrative, was poorly cast directed, and for that matter, lacked any real and effective directorial skills. The most shocking part of this mess was that experienced filmmaker Neil LaBute with over 30 directing and 35 writing credits under his belt, still hasn't learned a thing about filmmaking. A fifth grade drama class can write and direct a better film than him.

Every genre cliche that has been done many times before and better, was in this mess, and LaBute still managed to have the worst of them all. The entire story was generic, slow, predictable, riddled with plot and technical issues, and was, simply put; utter nonsense. What's worse, is that as the film progresses, it gets worse and dumber by the minute. As if a group of dangerous criminal invaders wouldn't have at least one gun - at least for intimidation or with a silencer if noise is an issue, and not one flashlight lol. Like I said, a fifth grader can come up with a more realistic story.

The time-stamps he added made things worse, because it showed what very little and unconvincing plot happens in between the large gaps in time, to the point that you will get tired from cringing and eye-rolls. Even the normally comfortable 90 min runtime felt way longer with terrible pacing, lack of any real plot and character development, long dragged out and unnecessary scenes, and if that wasn't torture enough, LaBute throws in this infantile and logic-defying epilogue just to punish and confuse the viewer some more.

Maybe with any other better filmmaker, even some newbs that have given us decent films, this nonsense may have been an adequate watch, but as is, don't waste your time, I did it for you. It's a generous 3/10 from me, for all the ladies that tried their best to fend off the lame hicks, lame story, and lame directing, that they had to endure.

If you enjoyed " You're Next" this movie will unfortunately leave a bitter taste in your mouth. I cant say that i disliked the plot of this movie and really had high hopes for it given Maggie Q as the lead. However the acting by the other ladies was lack luster and unbelievable and add this alongside a really poorly written script " voila", you get this . In this day and age who goes anywhere( worse yet in the middle of nowhere) knowing that communication signals are poor/none existent? Not even wifi? Come on! I watched in its entirety purely for Maggie Q and a curiosity ( hope) for at-least a creative ending.

I feel bad for Maggie Q. I really like her as an actress, and she should have never been in this movie. Everything about the film is so cringe. To the boring plot, the predictable scenes, the role your eyes "why on earth did you just do that?". Even the action scenes are boring and very few and far apart. The only nice part about the movie was the ending.

Eight girls take a trip out to the family cabin for a bachelorette party. Things go wrong.... Sounds like an interesting thriller right? There's no sex in the movie, very little gore and the blood looks like ketchup... It's so predictable and cliche and pretty much boring. Meggie Q was the only thing about the movie that was good. But one person cant carry an entire movie on their shoulders when everything else is horribly wrong with it.

I would love to sit here and gush over how Maggie Q got hosed on this deal and yada yada.. but she helped produce this mess. Maggie Q was fabulous as Nikita back in the day, but I'm starting to feel that ominous sensation when I see new movies she's in. It feels similar to when I see a new flick pop up with Bruce Willis's name on the cover. She's hot and slick, and usually acts pretty well- but everything else about this parade of toxic masculinity was cringy, vapid, and failed to conjure up entertainment value. I gave it a star because.. well, MQ is hot, slick, and still acts pretty well- even if surrounded by empty, single-dimensional cardboard cut-outs. For MQ fans only.