Will ‘It Comes At Night’ be worth your time? Review!

Similar to a lot of horror flicks, It Comes at Night opens with a death. From the very beginning, uncertainty and forfeiture reign in this film.

Designed to keep you confused and raw, this is a film in which the villains are human emotions themselves. At the end of it all, It Comes at Night proves to be just as complete as it is incomplete.

1. Quick Review

The film has been directed by Trey Edward Shults. It Comes At Night is a post-apocalyptic movie a little different from your average horror flick.

The film is set in a world ravaged by a mysterious virus that has killed off a large part of the population. It focuses on an isolated family’s attempts at survival in a contagious world.

It Comes At Night is a film in which the true elements of fear come from within. Although it is not entirely a new concept, there is definitely originality in the plot.

Its entire premise is open to individual interpretation, which proves to be another reason for it to work so well as a psychological horror film.

2. Is it worth watching?

It Comes At Night refuses to employ a lot of overused tropes in this genre. There are no zombies hiding behind curtains, no serial killers in the basement, or wizards in the woods.

It Comes At Night | Official Trailer HD | A24

Yet it is one of the terrifying films in years. The amount of horror Shults milks out without using generic tropes is remarkable.

There’s something incredibly unnerving and yet, exceptional about It Comes at Night. Stunningly shot and disturbingly scored, the film finds fear in moments of silence by capturing the frail state of the human condition.

The film is a meticulous piece of cinematography, unusually refined in execution for a horror flick. The filmmakers of It Comes At Night use horror to construct a psychological drama about family, violence, and the pain of isolation.

For a film that’s drawn to focusing on ideas rather than overused scare tactics, it leaves you feeling slightly hollow. Although it proves to be harrowingly beautiful, it ultimately feels muddled in its message.

I. Plot

It Comes At Night opens with an introduction to a family in isolation. The family consists of Paul (played by Joel Edgerton), his wife Sarah (played by Carmen Ejogo), their son Travis (played by Kelvin Harrison Jr), and pet dog Stanley. The family has been surviving in a ramshackle cabin in the woods cut off from fellow survivors.

One day, a man named Will (played by Christopher Abbott) breaks into the house. They make sure he’s virus-free and find out that he has a wife (played by Riley Keough) and a young son Andrew, (played by Griffin Robert Faulkner). Paul reluctantly allows Will and his family to live with them, however, distrust mounts between the two families as they suspect each other of bringing the virus into their home.

A form of anxiety towards mankind’s tendency of inhuman destruction underwrites the narrative. The warring home becomes an example of a global catastrophe. There are overt nods throughout the film to Romero’s Night of the Living Dead and Kubrick’s The Shining.

Shults also credits William Golding’s well-known novel Lord of the Flies as an inspiration. To this end, he also incorporates hellish Bruegel paintings into Karen Murphy’s production designs.

II. Music and Visuals

The music directors of this film are Brian Mcomber and Jordan Dykstra. Mcomber is an American music producer, film score composer, and percussionist. Dykstra is also an American film score composer and violist.

The film’s chilling score utilizes synths, lonesome strings, and the occasional tribal drum. This conjures a kind of primal darkness in the music that is both foreboding and deeply unsettling.

Visually, Shults and his cinematographer Drew Daniels create a tone of atmospheric horror. Daniels captures stunning visuals from the illumination of a lantern to the harsh glare of a flashlight.

The filmmakers manage to ground the plot in a largely tactile world. In several scenes, they capture the natural light coming through the trees in a way that adds to the tension.

3. Final Thoughts

The ambiguity of the ending makes the film even more intriguing. The climax of It Comes At Night doesn’t get into the details of the contagion. Nor does the movie offer much information about the virus or what it does to people.

Shults is careful to keep the backstory vague and shadowy. The setting itself is rather macabre in a subdued way. There’s a terrifying beauty to the cramped, lantern-lit interiors designed by Karen Murphy.

The long haunting corridor, the framed Brueghel depicting a plague, and the omen of a heavy red door. The chilling heartbeat of a score heightens the horror every step of the way.

4. Grade

5. Info