The Strangers
Bryan Bertino, 2008,
Having Helter Skelter as a primary inspiration doesn’t automatically make you a hack, but if your ultimate takeaway is limited to “Wouldn’t it be scary if a bunch of weirdos randomly attacked you in your home in the middle of the night?,” you’re probably a hack. Putting the attackers in “creepy” masks removes all doubt. (That said, I haven’t seen 2006’s Them since it came out, but I remember it using these same elements to much better effect, and in 2008 I initially assumed The Strangers was an inevitably inferior Hollywood remake.)
Hopefully I’ll never have to find out how I’d react if randomly attacked in my home in the middle of the night by said weirdos, but I would begrudge no one for judging me harshly if I behaved like the protagonists of this movie do. I realize this is a common criticism of horror films of all kinds, but Liv Tyler’s character’s suffocating fragility in particular is a special kind of maddening.
The whole thing is just so lazy and boring.
Also, this:
