Let the wrong ones in.
Three young thieves' supposedly easy heist -- burgling the house of a blind man -- turns into a night of terror as their mark reveals himself to be truly dangerous. This simple but engrossing premise propels Evil Dead director Fede Alvarez's brutal new horror-thriller Don't Breathe, one of the most twisted movies you'll see this year.
The Detroit-set story centers on Rocky (Jane Levy), who is determined to escape her dead end life even if it means breaking into wealthy homes with her boyfriend Money (Daniel Zovatto) and pal Alex (Dylan Minnette). Their proverbial last big score is to rob The Blind Man (Stephen Lang), an old veteran said to have a small fortune from a legal settlement stashed in his home in an abandoned neighborhood. (Their stagnate Michigan surroundings reflect the characters' own desperation.)
Unfortunately for the thieves, the Blind Man quickly proves more than capable of turning the tables. Rocky and Alex are now trapped inside his heavily fortified house of horrors. It turns out Money was right when he said that just because the old man is blind it doesn't mean he's a saint. The bad choices the young thieves make leads to a very fierce comeuppance -- and Alvarez makes us feel every excruciating moment of it without resorting to Saw-style torture porn.
Alvarez and his cinematographer, Pedro Luque, let the camera move through the Blind Man's home much like a prowler, allowing the viewer to glimpse just enough hints at certain items (like, say, a tool on a wall) that may pay off later. One of the film's strongest sequences is a basement scene where Rocky and Alex grope their way through the dark trying to not to run into the Blind Man, whose acute hearing gives him a distinct advantage.
Don't Breathe isn't just masterful at creating tension and dread, but also at toying with audiences' sympathies. Rocky's yearning for a better life for her and her kid sister is matched only by her greed and desperation, and Levy strikes a good balance in making us like her even at her worst. Minnette's Alex is actually a far more sympathetic character than either Rocky or her d-bag boyfriend Money. Alex, who clearly has feelings for Rocky, acts as if not the group's moral compass then at least their voice of reason.
Rocky and Alex may have sympathetic aspects, but ultimately they're criminals. So naturally we feel for the Blind Man, who we empathize with because he's a decorated veteran who has suffered his own personal tragedies. He is the audience surrogate for experiencing the universal fear of someone breaking into your home late at night, he is right to fight back and defend what's his ... and then his dark secret is exposed and we loathe him.
The ever-intense Stephen Lang nearly steals the show, delivering a largely non-verbal performance for a good chunk of the film and letting the Blind Man's physicality and relentlessness more than compensates for his lack of sight. These three thieves may as well have broken into the home of Stick from Daredevil.
The Verdict
Director Fede Alvarez delivers a lean, very mean thrill ride with Don't Breathe, tapping into several primal human fears and further establishing himself as one of the genre filmmakers to keep an eye on in the years ahead.
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