Don’t Breathe
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A group of friends break into a blind man’s house and end up with more than they bargained for. Produced by Sam Raimi, this wildly successful thriller combined suspense with some fairly brutal violence. Have a listen for our take on it.
Don’t Breathe (2016)
Episode 122, 2 Guys and a Chainsaw Horror Movie Review Podcast
Todd: Hello and welcome to another episode of 2 Guys and a Chainsaw. I’m Todd.
Craig: And I’m Craig.
Todd: And we continue this month with our series of films with the word don’t in the title. Today’s film is a more recent film. We haven’t really done a Todd film in a few episodes. This is 20 sixteen’s Don’t Breathe directed by do you say it Fede Alvarez?
Craig: I think it’s Fede, but I’m not sure.
Todd: He’s the director responsible, I think, for the Evil Dead remake. Is that right?
Clip: Yep. Yep.
Todd: And he wrote this film as well as directed it. It, was extremely successful. It made a ton of money. I think it was on the number one in the US box office for, like, 2 weeks, booted Suicide Squad off the off the list. Yeah. Successful film on the heels of the Evil Dead. And I read a little bit of an interview with the director that said he deliberately made this film as a response to some of the criticisms he got from Evil Dead. Being that he some a lot of people at Evil Dead was a little too bloody, a little too over the top. And so he wanted to go with something so little more psychological and less gory than that. And, and we got this film. I enjoyed watching this movie. Craig, have you seen this one before?
Craig: No. I hadn’t seen it, but I’d wanted to for a while. I had had several people tell me that I should see it. In fact, I think maybe 1 or more than one person, suggested that we do this for the podcast at some point. And so, yeah, I was, looking forward to it, and it was, yeah. It was a nice nice I don’t wanna say surprise. I wasn’t terribly surprised by it, although there were some kind of shocking turns of events that I didn’t see coming. But, overall, I, you know, I thought it was a good movie.
Todd: Yeah. It was it was fine. I wouldn’t say it was superb. In fact, I think there’s some things that really bothered me about it, even from kind of a moral standpoint, but I think we can get into that as we talk about the the plot probably.
Craig: Sure.
Todd: So one thing I did appreciate about this movie, and we don’t see this a lot in films, is it was set in modern day Detroit, which, is a great setting for a horror film. Yeah. I I lived, I lived in the Detroit area way back in the eighties before it kinda went downhill. Detroit has a pretty sad history, you know, of, well, it’s always had a bit of a history of some violence. But then especially lately with, all the industry really closing down, the auto industry going into decline, it’s really been a city that’s kinda fallen apart and a lot of it’s gone into decay. And I think that the fact that the house so this is this is basically a home invasion story, but but more or less in reverse. It’s from the point of view of the people invading the home. The street that this house is located on is basically, it’s like the only occupied house on the street. They’re all abandoned. Their whole neighborhood’s like this in Detroit right now. I’m sure they shot it on location in one of these places.
Craig: They did.
Todd: And so, it’s it’s sad. It’s an interesting setting though for a movie like this, and it does neatly neatly answer some of those questions about home invasion movies, like, the problems they normally have such as what are all the other neighbors doing while this noise is happening next door? Right. As somebody put it, I saw online, it instead of the, scariest house in the nicest neighborhood, it’s the nicest house in the scary neighborhood.
Craig: Right. Yeah. And they did. All the exterior shots, are actual shots of a neighborhood in Detroit. I guess they they shot the interiors, like, in the Ukraine or, I don’t know, somewhere not in the states. But yeah. And I guess if you Google map, the address of this house, you can see it, and it pretty much looks the same way it does in the movie and is surrounded by kinda all these abandoned houses just as it is in the movie. So it it’s a stark setting, but, it’s it’s believable. I mean, it’s it’s realistic.
Clip: Yeah. That’s what it is.
Todd: It makes it kind of bleak from the very beginning. And I think it serves as well to just without even saying it outright, show you the desperation involved in all of the characters in this film. You know?
Craig: Yeah.
Todd: This is a movie where I’d almost say, like, everybody’s a bad guy in this film. And that was one of the problems I had with it. I really had trouble, especially in the beginning, garnering sympathy from the characters I think we were supposed to have sympathy for. The characters in the beginning are Rocky, who is a young woman who does she have a kid or is this her younger sister?
Craig: It’s her younger sister. The one of the things I have to say for it is that it’s shot really well. I mean, I think that, Alvarez is a good director. And, the you know, just from the very beginning, the very first shot is this big sweeping aerial shot that zooms down in on this street, and you kinda can’t it it looks very desolate because it is, and you can’t really tell what’s going on at first. But as the camera pans in, you see that it’s this man dragging a body, a woman’s body down the street by the hair. And that’s just kinda very shocking just because, you know, it we’re not real the setting really hasn’t been established yet. So just to see in broad daylight somebody dragging a woman by the hair down the street, I mean, that’s just kind of shocking in and of itself. And, of course, we come back to that later on. I didn’t know. I didn’t know who the girl was. And then it’s a very limited cast. There are very few people in the movie, and I found myself wondering, you know, about 20 minutes into the movie if that girl was the main girl that we get, acquainted with, and and I just wasn’t sure for the longest time. Eventually, of course, you figure it out. But, yeah, it’s it’s these kids. Rocky is, the girl. She’s played by Jane Levy. Jane Levy was also in Alvarez’s evil dead. She was the lead. She took over the Ash role, and people really liked her in that role. I thought that remake was okay. I much prefer the originals. It was well made. I just it didn’t really have the same tone as the originals. But, anyway, she was in that. And then there’s, Alex, who was played by Dylan Minnette, who is kinda he must be kind of an up and coming kid because I just see him. I see him a lot. Like, his face is really familiar, and he just pops up and things. The most recent thing I saw him in was a movie on Netflix called The Open House, which, had a really good premise, but ultimately was kinda disappointing. But he I I think that he’s been around and is gonna be around for a while. And, then the 3rd guy in the group is his name is Money. I assume that’s not his real name, but that’s your James Altman. And he’s played by Daniel Zavato, another young actor who’s been in a few things. And there are these 3 kids, and, the first time that we see them, they are robbing this fancy house. And they have, like, these rules, like, they can’t take in more than, what, like, $10,000 worth of, stuff, and it can’t be cash. They can’t steal cash. I guess Alex kind of knows the law enough to know how charges are filed and things. And as long as they don’t take a certain amount and as long as they’re not stealing cash, if they’re caught, the charges will be relatively minimal. So they’ve got these rules. But money is also just kind of a dick, and, like so as they’re ransacking this house, he’s, like, breaking things on purpose and peeing on the floor. And, like, obviously, they’re just establishing that he’s the big jerk of the, group. And I and I get what you’re getting at, the it’s hard to sympathize with any of them. You know, they try to establish sympathy. We see Rocky at home, and, you know, she lives in this kinda Craig
Clip: darling. Get your mother a large four cheese from Tony’s. Sir Trevor’s living here now? Don’t be a bitch, Roxanne. It’s just a few months till he can find a new job. You have no money in here. You pay for it then. I know you’re making money.
Craig: And Rocky’s got this little sister who it appears like she wants to take care of. So they they try to establish sympathy, but it’s kinda hard to sympathize with them when really, you know, their whole plan for their future success is ripping people off. But whatever.
Todd: Yeah. The idea is that it that, you know, you get through this some of their conversation is that Rocky wants a better life, I guess, for her sister, but I suppose also for her sister.
Craig: Right.
Todd: And so as soon as they get enough money from robbing houses, then they’re gonna move to California. She’s gonna take her away secretly, I guess, to California.
Craig: Right.
Todd: That’s her plan. And then Alex seems to be a little interested in Rocky
Clip: Yeah.
Todd: Even though apparently Rocky and Money have a relationship. Right. He calls her his bitch at some point.
Clip: Right. Right.
Todd: And so of all of them, Alex, I think is the one who you’re supposed to feel a little more sympathy for, except for the fact that their whole shtick is is basically thanks to Alex. Yeah. Alex’s family or dad runs a security company, and they install home burglary systems for people or home burglary prevention system
Craig: for people.
Todd: And so their MO is to use the spare keys that his dad keeps in his desk. I guess it’s a small operation. Use the spare keys that the dad keeps in his desk to get into the house, disarm the alarm system with the codes that they have. And then, once they steal everything, they leave the house and then rearm it and then break a big window. So it looks like just somebody broke in and set off the alarm, but got away before the they could be caught. Right. He’s the one with who, you know, who insists on all these rules and he seems to be a little more nervous and he seems to be carrying a little more for Rocky and as as money as the jerk, then I think, Alex is supposed to be the the nicer guy who who truly has deeper feelings for her and really could give her what she needs. Right.
Craig: Exactly.
Todd: And seems interested in leaving with her as well and the girls. So, you know, I mean, all that kinda comes and goes by my biggest problem with it from a moral standpoint, and this is why it was hard to get behind the characters for me is they had other they clearly have other alternatives. Yeah. Rob your mom. Okay? Like, who do you really have the problem with? Okay. I mean, there’s an early there’s a scene in there where she looks through her mom’s purse and she doesn’t have money to get the pizza. But surely, just take stuff from your mom, take stuff from your mom to lose her boyfriend, and then get out of there. You only need a few $100 to go to California and then, you know, you’d get a job as a waitress. It’s really Yeah. Exactly.
Craig: I mean, you know, not to play the race card or whatever, but especially Alex and Rocky are these young, able-bodied white kids. Like, you could probably find a way out. You know what I mean? Like, this this isn’t your only option. And it it becomes even murkier because then I don’t remember how they find out. I don’t remember if there’s newspaper clippings or if they’re looking through the dad’s files or what, but they find this mark.
Clip: Story goes, some preppy girl a few years ago ran over this guy’s daughter. Jesus. Daughter dies, and this preppy, rich ass family pays him off. Gives him a big ass settlement. Settlement. Told me your honor. Alright? This guy is sitting on at least 300 k.
Craig: He’s ex military. They deduce that this guy must be keeping all the cash in his house.
Clip: I I
Craig: don’t It’s kinda silly. Yeah. Kinda silly. I don’t really get why they think that that would be true. It turns out it is, but still. Yeah. And and Alex doesn’t wanna do it. First of all, because they’re gonna be stealing cash, which is one of their no no’s, and it’s, you know, a large sum of money much bigger. So, you know, it would be if they were to be caught, it would be a big deal. You know, they could be facing prison for a long time. He doesn’t wanna do it, but because Rocky does and because Rocky basically says, well, we’re gonna do it whether you do or not, Alex kinda goes along with it. And so that’s what they do. Now here’s where I started okay. So they stake out this guy. They stake out his house, and they realize because money sets up, like, his cell phone or something and and tapes, surveillance for, like, you know, 24 hour period or something, and he realizes that nobody’s around. All the rest of these houses are abandoned, so that should make it easy. And while they’re, staking the place out, this great big rottweiler dog jumps up on their car, and it turns out that that’s their Mark’s dog. And so they see the guy, and they see that he’s blind. And they’re like, oh, well, good. He’s blind. No big deal. They also, money says, well, he’s a a hermit. He doesn’t leave the house, so we’re gonna have to do it while he’s there. That’s what they decide to do. So they go there at night, and then this is the problem. I may have already said that, but this is the problem really that I have with it. From the time they get there, they’re really just so stupid. It’s just the worst plan ever. They’re they’re trying to get in and everything’s locked up and the windows are all barred and, first they have to neutralize the dog which isn’t really that big a deal. They just tranquilize the dog and it goes to sleep. But then they’re just they’re walking up to the house with flashlights and, like, they’re jumping over the fence and they’re rattling the doors. I’m like, I get it that maybe there aren’t a lot of people around, but you might wanna play it a little bit more low key. You know? Like, come on. Oh, yeah. And then, you know, like, they have trouble getting in. Like, yes, they have the key, but it turns out that this guy has multiple locks and dead bolts and all kinds of things. Like, obviously, he’s trying to keep people out. Rocky climbs through a little tiny window, and even that window is bugged to the security alarm, but Alex also has this remote control that, like, automatically neutralizes all these alarms. So once she gets in there, she uses the remote control to reset the alarm so it doesn’t go off. And then they all get in there and they all take off their shoes and leave them at the door, I guess, to be quiet, but then they’re not quiet at all. Like, I get okay. So this guy’s Todd. Fine. Whatever. He’s blind. Okay. But even if I were not old and blind, I would have heard these people
Todd: Yeah. Mildly.
Craig: Walk yes. I mean, like, it’s not they’re not quiet at all. Like, it’s that was my problem with it. I just felt like they were really dumb. Like, they’re not good at what they
Todd: do. No. They’re really not, especially as it gets on later. So when they first come into the house, there’s a really, really cool setup. This is one thing I loved about this movie is that there’s an extremely long one take shot that follows them. It’s almost like we’re breaking into the house with them and sneaking through the house with
Clip: them. Mhmm.
Todd: And it sweeps around them and around the room as they go into these different rooms and kinda poke around and look. And the camera deliberately, like, dollies into and backs away or switches up to or comes around to all of these little details in the house that will every single one of them are going to figure in the plot as it goes along. And As soon as I recognized it was doing this, I just started writing things down. I was like, oh, broken glass on the floor. Ham A camera wall in here. Yeah. Photos. There’s a weird bell on the ceiling. There’s a a a closet, you know, shelf in there. There’s a door lock there. Then then it sweeps up even through the floor. So, it’s up to the 2nd floor and even takes us through apparently, there’s a space, you know, between the floors. And then that takes us through that. And we even see that later. Yeah.
Clip: And all
Todd: the way sweeps up into this guy’s room under his bed first, where there’s a gun strapped in, and then around to this guy. And I think that we’re supposed to believe that because this guy left the TV on, I guess he was playing home videos of his daughter. Yeah. Yeah. And and fell asleep. And so, I might give them that pass, except for the fact that we all know that when you’re blind, your senses are heightened. Right. And especially, your sense of hearing that obviously comes into play big time in, you know, in the rest the movie. And so you would think even with all the noise they’re making, you know, it’s just it’s still still gonna be a problem.
Craig: He’s got the home movies on, but it’s not like it’s blaring. It’s not like he’s got his Dolby surround sound. You know? It’s like Yeah. He he’s got it’s very quiet, you know, as he’s sleeping. Okay. So I guess willing suspension of disbelief, he doesn’t hear them. Alright. Whatever. So money goes up to his, room. You know, I don’t know how they know how to do all this stuff, but apparently, they’re also amateur chemists because money has this water bottle contraption that, like, he pokes a hole in, and there’s some liquid in it. And he drops some sort of capsule in it, and it becomes like a chloroform bomb. But while he’s in there and and there I appreciated these shots, like, you know, he sees the guy sleeping on the bed, and then it cuts back to him, and then he starts the chloroform bomb, and then all of a sudden it cuts back wide, and you see that the guy has woken up and is sitting up in bed. And it’s jarring. And you get a lot of shots like that where this this guy, you know, just kinda pops up in frame out of nowhere unexpectedly, and, that’s it’s effective. It’s it’s scary, and, you know, it it’s Yeah. It’s certainly tense, and you don’t know what’s gonna happen. And at first, this guy seems really feeble. And I and I didn’t know if that was an act from the beginning or if, you know, that’s just kind of his nature and it’s only when he becomes threatened that his kick ass ex military vibe kicks in. I don’t know. But the guy lays back down. He he does the chloroform bomb, and, then he goes downstairs, and he’s, like, stomping around and yelling. And they’re, like, shut up. And he’s, like, no, it’s okay. He’s out. Like, okay. How do you know? Yeah.
Clip: I know. I think so.
Todd: Oh my god. Yeah. That bothered me. It was just a it’s just a movie trick. It’s just so that they don’t have to worry about it. You know? So the people can talk at normal tones so they can have them do all these actions and things and not and then they they find a door. You know, they’ve looked all around the house. They’re not sure where this money is, but there’s a door that has a padlock over it. And it’s padlocked, I mean, and this is needs to be said, it’s padlocked from the the outside.
Craig: Mhmm.
Todd: Right? So if you’re if you want to go to the basement, the padlock is on this side for you to unlock and to go to the basement. And they can’t get into it, obviously, but they’re sure that obviously the money or something must be behind us. Maybe it’s a closet or whatnot. And money solution is to pull a gun Mhmm. Out, which he had snuck in, which is another one of their rules that, you know, they’re they’re supposed to against another one of their rules. And so everybody’s freaked out that Money has a gun and Money decides he’s going to shoot the lock off with the gun. Now this is stupid. I know in movies, people run and they shoot locks off of things. It’s usually in like Die Hard or something like that. When somebody’s cornered up against a wall and they have no other choice and they happen to have a gun in their hand and so they blast a lock and it goes you know, I realize this is a movie thing, but this is different. This is you presumably have all the time in the world and you’re faced at a at a lock in a house where there’s a guy upstairs who you’ve gassed out and you’re robbing the place. Whose bright idea is it that you’re gonna try to shoot the lock off?
Craig: Right.
Todd: And especially when it’s on this side.
Craig: Right. And like, don’t you have a screwdriver?
Todd: Like, yes. Just get a screwdriver. There is a whole room full of tools, like like, 12 feet next to you.
Craig: Right. But one of the things that I did like was because, as soon as, money pulls out the gun, Alex is like, I’m out.
Clip: Do you have any idea what bringing a gun to a burglary means? Yeah. It gives me a better chance to defend myself, Alex. What do you mean? You just gave this guy the legal right to shoot us. Lucky, let you go. I know what you’re saying. We have to leave. This is not good.
Craig: Now in most movies, he would just look at her with puppy dog eyes and be like, okay. But no. I liked in this movie, he’s like, nope. I’m out. See? Yeah. And and and he takes off. Money does shoot the lock and it pops off conveniently. But as soon as he does that, again, we get another one of those surprise shots with, hello. The blind guy is standing right there. And he’s like, who’s there? And money’s like, you know, stay where you are. I’ve got a gun. And meanwhile, Rocky is standing off to the side just being very quiet. What goes down basically is money’s trying to play it all tough. The the guy the blind guy steps on the lock and reaches over and feels that the basement door is open and is obviously startled by that. And so he slowly starts to approach. And, of course, he seems very feeble. He’s blind. He’s reaching out. But, again, all the time, you know, like, he’s he gets to the point where he’s about 6 inches away from money. And I’m like, god. You are so dumb. This guy’s ex military. Like
Clip: Yeah. Come
Craig: on. You know? And and so, of course, this guy, this feeble guy turns not feeble at all and grabs the gun and and gets money, pinned up against the wall and and turns the gun on him, at which point money starts pleading for his life. And the the guy is like, how many of you are there? And Money looks over at at, Rocky, and he just says, it’s just me. I’m alone. It’s just me. Please let me go. I’ll just go. But instead, he shoots him in the head. He’s dead, which, you know, you see coming a mile away.
Clip: A mile away. Yeah. Of course, that
Craig: guy is gonna be dead. So Rocky quietly hides herself in a nearby closet, and Alex, having heard the shot and the commotion, comes back in. Meanwhile, the blind guy, whose name we never get, so I’m just gonna have to keep calling him the blind guy.
Todd: Yeah.
Craig: He he starts going around fortifying the house, like putting up padlocks on the doors on the inside and, like, boarding up the windows and stuff. But, eventually, once he’s got that done and, you know, Alex and and Rocky are in close proximity, you know, just hiding and being very quiet while he’s doing these things. He goes into the closet where Rocky is and he uncovers this safe behind the wall and he punches in the code and she’s watching so she can see, you know, what he’s he’s punching in. He opens up the safe and, like, feels in there, apparently checking to make sure that whatever’s in there is still in there, and then he closes it up again. And the the passcode is just illuminated right up, you know, on the safe. And so then he goes down to the basement, and Alex joins Money in the closet because they’ve texted each other where they are. And he’s, like, come on. We’ve gotta get out of here. And she’s, like, no. Hold on a second. And she opens the safe back up and starts pulling out these huge stacks of money. And, again, you know, like you said, it’s hard to like these people because even though Yeah. Even though I felt for Rocky’s plight, I really did. I wanted her to get out from under her trashy mom. I wanted her to, you know, get away and have a new life or whatever. But when it comes down to life and death, you know, just just go. Like like Yeah. Cut your losses and go.
Todd: Yeah. And and and this to this point, it is these jerks are breaking into this house of this feeble well, he’s not feeble, but a blind disabled army guy who’s had his daughter taken away from him in a horrible accident, and they’re gonna steal all his settlement money. Mhmm. That he kills their friend in self defense
Craig: Right.
Todd: More or less. I mean, what else is he gonna do? Sure. They’re gonna steal his money and then leave. You know? I was like, I don’t care what happens to these people. You know? That was how that was exactly how I felt at this point in the movie. I’m like, you go get them, guy. And I kinda wondered, are we really are are we really supposed to feel sympathy for them? You know, I was even going that route. I thought there would be an interesting twist where, you know, we’d be rooting for the guy, you know, at some point. Because I kinda was at this I mean, I gotta be honest.
Craig: I I
Todd: didn’t like them. And I and I kinda tuned out. I mean, at this point, I kinda tuned out, honestly, in the movie. I, you know, I just detached emotionally from what was happening. And I, you know, just for me, it was just kind of, alright. Let’s see what goes on.
Craig: Well, and at this point, you know, this is still relatively early in the movie. And I was thinking, where is this gonna go? Or, you know, are they just gonna be sneaking around this house for the next hour? Like, I I was I was I I didn’t know what was gonna happen. But, you know so they start to try to sneak out, but it when they’re out in the big open room where the body is, the blind guy comes back up and he’s, like, bagging up the body in, like, trash bags. I don’t know if he was just gonna hide it or bury it. Anyway, they’re sneaking you know, trying to sneak by, and Alex steps on a creaky board. And of course, the blind guy hears. They freeze, but he takes his gun and just kinda starts scanning it around the room. And it, you know, at some point, it it’s pointed at both of them, but, he doesn’t fire at that point. I guess he’s satisfied that he was just hearing things. The blind guy leaves the room. They decide to go down into the basement because they think that the only door that’s not locked from the inside or or the only door that they saw that they could get out of potentially, was this cellar door. So they they head down to the cellar, which the door is right there, and they have to climb a ladder down in there. And then it looks just very much like a, ordinary seller and they’re kind of looking around. Meanwhile, upstairs, the blind guy is walking around and he ends up in the kitchen, and all of sudden, he Todd, and he starts sniffing the air. And immediately, I said, oh my god. The shoes. Because they had taken off their shoes when they came in. I was like, he smells their feet. But when Alex had left, he put his shoes back on. So when the blind guy finds the shoes, he finds 2 pair. So and and he sniffs 1, and I guess by the smell of it, he can tell it’s a girl. So he knows, he thinks that there’s at least 1, girl still in there. And see so he kinda starts going around looking around. Meanwhile, down in the cellar, this is where the big twist came. Now I have to say, I I guess it was when, I don’t know, when when he was looking in the Mhmm. We realized that the money was in the safe, I immediately thought, well, then what’s in the seller? Because he’s he’s obvious you know, that is so locked up and so secure, and he’s so worried about that. What’s down there? And I I thought it it can’t be good. And so while they’re down there, they eventually think that they’re nearing the door. But before they get to the door, there’s a jump scare and, it turns out that he has a woman chained up in the basement in this big padded kind of cell. And it’s it’s, it’s a really cool set piece. It’s it’s very unsettling. You know, I I read that Alvarez was inspired by lots of horror movies and kinda tried to give little nods to horror movies. We had already kind of seen a a nod to Cujo when the dog jumped up at the car window, and, this gave me serious Silence of the Lambs vibes.
Todd: Oh, yeah. It even looks kinda like the Silence of the Lambs set. Yeah. I mean, it’s almost even the same similar design. Right?
Craig: Oh, yeah. And I I I’m certain that was intentional. But then, you know, at that point, that’s that’s a big twist. You know? Now Yeah. Now I’m back in it. Like, what’s going on? You know? Who is this guy? Why does he have some chick tied up in the basement? But very easy exposition, this girl who is she’s not gagged, but she’s got something over her mouth so she can’t talk. She’s pleading with them. And again, Alex, the voice of reason.
Clip: She’s the one who killed his daughter. We have to get her out of here. No. No. No. Rocky, we don’t have time. Well, we’ll get out of here and we’ll call the cops and then they’ll come find her. Alright?
Craig: Yeah. Like, yes. That is what you should do. But she’s like, no. I I can’t leave this girl down here.
Todd: Yeah.
Craig: He’s exacting his revenge on on this girl. So they so they do. They they unchain her, and they get to the door. And meanwhile, you know, all this time, we’re hearing him kind of upstairs looking around, and it sounds like he’s coming down. And they’re like, he’s coming. He’s coming. He’s coming. They’re trying to go out the cellar door, and Alex eventually gets it open. And, of course, the blind guy’s standing right there, and he just blindly fires down, into the cellar. But one of the bullets hits the prisoner girl in the neck. Right?
Todd: Yeah. In the neck. Or the cheek or something. Yeah.
Craig: Well She’s dead. Yeah. She’s she’s dead. They hide. The 2 living kids hide in the basement, and the and the blind guy comes down and he’s distraught. Like, he finds the body of this girl and he’s distraught. Like, he’s so upset about it. And I was watching this with my partner. He hardly ever watches movies with me, but I was on a time crunch, and he was willing to watch this. I I was, like, why is why is this guy so upset about his right? And he’s, like, I don’t know. But there’s there’s more to this going on than we know. And and there was.
Todd: Yeah. There’s a reveal later. The what I think is really clever about this point, and I I know this movie probably for you Todd was giving me serious, wait until dark vibes.
Craig: I don’t know that I’ve ever seen that.
Todd: It was a movie, but it was originally a play, and that’s about a bunch of thieves who break into a blind woman’s house. They kind of terrorize her as they’re coming in. It’s a terrifying movie, but of course, it’s terrifying because you’re you have a ton of sympathy for the blind woman. And, you know, up until this point, that’s how I felt about this movie. But then, kind of lightweight until dark as well, it it there’s this nice reversal moment where the, blind guy cuts the power. So they’re plunged into darkness in the basement. And so they’re experiencing blindness, right, where he obviously has the upper advantage. And I thought this is a really clever part of the movie, first of all, to do that reversal, but also set up some really chilling moments. And I’m really happy that they filmed it in such a way that we could still see what was going on.
Craig: Right.
Todd: It’s not like we just hear a bunch of stuff and it’s blackness for the next 10 minutes, but we get to see how close they are in proximity Todd each other while they’re while they’re going through. And the actor’s eyes are dilated. It’s it’s almost shot very faintly. It’s really hard to describe, I suppose, like the night vision on a on a camera or something.
Craig: But without that annoying green green
Todd: Yeah. Yeah. Like a really light night vision. Right. Not not the stark stuff that you get. And it was really well done. And there’s a really chilling moment in there too where, you know, they’re kind of going after each other. And, he the guy has Todd, and he’s looking down one way. And unbeknownst to him, Rocky is quietly pawing her way in the direction. You know, she’s just trying to get out, and we see that she’s about to reach right out for him unknowingly and touch him. And as soon as she gets that close, Alex yells out for Rocky, and the guy takes off in that direction. So this is a really good sequence, I thought. I did too. Really quite clever.
Craig: The thing that I liked about it was, yes, it’s very obvious that he’s very much aware of his surroundings. Like, he uses his hands to orient himself. Like, he knows, you know, here is the, a ceiling rail. Here is the bell or yeah. Whatever. You know? So he he’s very, you know, he’s oriented to this space, and of course, they’re not. But the thing that I found most haunting about this was he realizes that they’re running around, and every once in a while, they’re calling each other’s name to try to hook up, you know, faintly, but it’s silent down there so he can hear them. And the part that I found most chilling was at one point, he, the blind guy, just stops in his tracks and just takes a couple of steps back into the darkness. And, of of course, I mean, if that’s if you’re being smart, that’s what you would do. If these people are scared and are running around and trying to, you know, just wait, you know? Yeah. Eventually eventually they’re gonna cross your path or they’re gonna run right into you or or whatever, especially if there’s only one way out, which there is because he broke a key in the padlock, for the the outside door. And so the only way out is this ladder that goes up, and so if he can just wait them out, it was just it was a chilling image of him just stopping and standing, you know, silently for a second and then just kind of backing into the shadows. And I was
Clip: like, oh. Yeah.
Todd: Yeah. I agree. Now why he didn’t just back himself up to the only exit, wait for them to to, you know, work their way there, I’m not quite sure.
Clip: I think he did. I think
Craig: I think that’s what happens. I think that he was near the ladder and that she was approaching the ladder, but then when, Alex called her name, then he went towards Alex’s voice. So it was just a timing thing. But he finds Alex, actually. He reaches through a a a shelving unit and grabs Alex by the throat, and, you know, it’s a struggle. But eventually, Alex pushes the whole shelving unit over on him. And so Alex and Rocky end up back upstairs, and they think they’re okay. They they kinda jam a crowbar under the door, so they think that they’re in the clear. But then, uh-oh, the dog’s awake.
Todd: And Dog’s inside. Did you forget about me? Right.
Craig: And, the the dog Alex sends Rocky. He gives he has got these keys that they found. He sends her to try to unlock the front door, but then the dog starts chasing them, and they end up getting chased upstairs.
Todd: Yeah. They barricade themselves into the room. And in the meantime, the blind guy has gotten out and he goes straight to his bedroom, and gets the gun from under his bed. Right.
Clip: Right.
Todd: So, yeah. At this point, it starts getting a little weird and murky, I think. So the guy’s, you know, pounding on the door. He’s clearly gonna get through. They pushed a wardrobe up against it, but that’s not gonna hold. So Alex, tells her to climb into the vent. Mhmm. The old classic climb into the vent stick, and which is is really the space between the two floors. Right. I’ll I’ll suspend my disbelief for that one Todd. Sure. There’s a space this wide between the floors that she can get into that has a vent over it. Anyway, so she does that. And then, of course, the guy breaks in and, backs Alex up against, a window, and Alex falls backwards. I don’t understand this. I thought that all of the windows and everything were barred and they had no hope of leaving that room.
Craig: Right.
Todd: But suddenly, when the guy burst in, Alex is able to fall backwards out of the window.
Craig: Out of the window that now apparently is unbarred and onto Yeah. And onto a skylight that we had never seen before.
Todd: I mean Well, we had seen it. Had we? We had seen it. Yeah. It was one of those one of those clues that was panned upwards when
Craig: it first
Todd: came through the house. But blink it and you miss it, you know, kinda thing.
Craig: It was and yeah. And I’m writing things down as we go. But, he falls on the skylight. And, I mean, kinda silly, but at the same time, you know, it’s tense. Like, he’s unconscious. He’s laying on the skylight. Now it doesn’t it didn’t make any sense to me why at that point the blind guy stopped pursuing him there. Instead, like like so he’s unconscious on this skylight, and then the blind guy goes downstairs. Like and, like, he’s looking around downstairs, and he doesn’t, I mean, it wouldn’t he’s not looking around because he’s blind. So it wouldn’t make any sense for him to look up at the skylight, I guess, but he doesn’t even think about that. But then as Alex wakes up on the skylight that is slowly, you know, cracking, he he rolls over, and he looks up, and the blind guy is right above him in the window, and he shoots at him. But, of course, it doesn’t hit him, but it shatters the skylight, and so he falls back in, to the house. And at at at this point, you know, it’s there’s so much, it’s it’s really just, a big fight, you know, chase scene. If I get things out of order, I apologize. This was the point of the night where, it was late, and I had a couple of drinks.
Clip: So things are
Craig: things are getting a little muddy for me
Clip: at this point.
Todd: And maybe if you were like if you were like me, I was just okay. I I mean, even with the big reveal, I still didn’t feel a lot of sympathy with these characters, to be honest. I just thought they were all pretty terrible. So, yeah, if you were like me, I had just kinda disconnected from it. I was just watching things happen. The guy comes back down to meet him. I think the dog is chasing Rocky through the
Craig: Through the fence, which okay.
Todd: And and she comes to a point where there’s, like, a long shaft that leads down. I I that doesn’t make any real sense either. But anyway, she ends up I think plunging down into that and and hurts herself. Then, Alex and this guy have a big fight in the tool room. I think he has tucked away the body of money in the tool room.
Craig: Yeah.
Todd: Which kind of pops out at one point just so we can see it. And it’s a pretty brutal fight between them. Alex does grab the the hammer from the wall. And I think their whole fight still has that same problem that a lot of these things do, is that each of them are taking way more than the human body could possibly sustain. And not only stay alive, but also be able to then stand up and continue. You know?
Craig: Yeah. Yeah. But again, this was really shocking. And I don’t know, maybe it was satisfying for you because you didn’t like these characters, but the blind guy beats the shit out of him.
Todd: Like Yeah. I like that, actually.
Craig: It is just brutal. Like, he’s got him, you know, by his shirt, and he’s he’s just pounding on his face. And I’m like, dang. Like, it it it’s really brutal violence. And that’s when the movie was over, I was like, man, that movie was, you know, pretty brutally violent in some places.
Todd: It’s true. And he A realistic kind of violence.
Craig: Yeah. And and they’re in the tool room, so he grabs these huge shears. And now I don’t know if this was supposed to be misdirection or if I just wasn’t looking.
Todd: Yeah.
Craig: But I I thought that he stabbed Alex with the shears.
Todd: He plunges it straight down and we see a close-up of the shears entering a body.
Craig: Right. But as it turns out, it was the dead body. It was Money’s body. But I thought that it was Alex and I was like, woah. I didn’t see that coming because
Todd: Yeah. Me neither.
Craig: Even though, you know, all of the characters are kind of unlikable, Dylan Minnette, the guy that plays Alex, just has a really kind of sweet innocent face. And, you know, I I thought he’s gonna be okay. He’s kind of the good one. He’s the only one that really has kind of a moral compass, so he’ll be alright. And then these shears just get plunged into what I thought was his body, and I was, super surprised. Turns out it wasn’t him, but, we’ll we’ll get into that here in just a brief moment. But that that the blind guy believes that he’s killed Alex, so, he goes then after Rocky.
Todd: So he gets Rocky.
Craig: And then he beats the shit out of her.
Todd: Beats the shit out of her, and then she gets knocked out. Then he takes her
Craig: Oh my god. Then she’s the she’s the new slave girl.
Todd: Yeah. This part I saw coming, but this part, ugh, this is gross.
Craig: It is gross, but at the like, gross in a way that I can be like, oh my god. I can’t believe you went there. But dang. So okay. So she’s the new slave girl. So, you know, it’s at least in my mind, it’s implied that she’s gonna be his sex slave or something. I don’t know. And, you know, when when the other girl when we found out that the other girl was chained up down there again, I was talking to my partner, and I was like, you know, it’s not okay, but I get it. You know? He’s exacting his revenge. He’s got motive. This girl killed his daughter. So you can’t do that to people, obviously, but at least it makes sense. So now he’s got this new girl and he explains
Clip: She should have gone to prison, but rich girls don’t go to jail. Cindy took my child away from me. I thought it only fair that she’d give me a new one. She was pregnant with my baby. You killed them both. Well, they would be alive if you hadn’t broken into my home.
Craig: And he also says I never was going to hurt her, And I told her that as soon as she gave me what I wanted, I would let her go, and I would never bother her again. But you took that away from me, so now you’re gonna have to give it to me. And he starts he starts cranking her up in these, it’s not chains. It’s like canvas straps. He, like, he’s cranking her up so she’s in the air on her back. And he says, don’t worry. I’m not a rapist. I never touched her. And then he pulls out
Todd: Oh, jeez.
Craig: A baster, a turkey baster, and dips it into
Todd: a container. Of frozen stuff that he pulled out of the fridge or freezer and heated up again. And you get a nice, close-up interior shot of the baster as this juice is being sucked up and there’s a little hair
Craig: in it.
Todd: You are such It is so it is so disgusting.
Craig: That freaked Allen out. He’s like, write that down. That’s so disgusting. There’s hair in it. But it’s it is. It’s so nasty. You’re you’re you’re so funny. You’re such a press. It’s it’s not juice. It’s it’s it’s cum.
Clip: It’s sebum. And and
Craig: and it’s disgusting. And, like, he’s he’s walking towards her, and the camera is just close-up on this baster. And it’s dripping. It’s like Oh, god. So nasty. And I guess Alvarez somebody asked him what he used for that substance, and he said I I used the same thing that they use when they need fake stuff for the porn movies. I didn’t even know that was a thing. I I didn’t know they were using fake stuff in porn, but alright. Whatever. And so it’s it’s so meanwhile, Alex wakes up upstairs, and and it’s revealed that he’s not dead. And so he’s kinda making his way downstairs, but, it’s a really tense scene where this guy, he takes a knife and he slits open her pants and, like, he’s, you know, taking the turkey baster towards her private area. And, Oh, you’re such a priss. Fine. What would you like to call it, Todd? Go go right ahead.
Todd: No. That’s quite alright.
Clip: I’ll go right ahead. So
Craig: but anyway, luckily, Alex, right at the last second shows up and and hits him on the head from behind with what? Is it the big mallet? Is it I don’t know. Something. Blood sprays.
Todd: Yeah. And he waxed her a few times. And, and then she he he’s down back, you know, he’s against the corner wall. I I think she Rocky takes a couple turns on him too, and then she grabs the turkey baster and just shoves it in his mouth.
Craig: Oh my god. That I I literally almost threw up.
Todd: I didn’t know. It’s like, how does that taste?
Clip: Oh my god.
Craig: Oh god. I I there are so many in poor taste jokes I could make right now that I’m not going to. I but I I I literally, literally almost threw up. Anyway
Todd: But, again, this man takes way more than I mean, he should be dead by now. I mean Yeah. We’ve whacked him with a mallet or a hammer into oblivion.
Craig: She wants to kill him, but Alex is like, we don’t have to. We can take the money. We can call the cops and or or not call the cops. We take the money. It’s like he needs us, to take the money because that way he’s got something on us. We’ve got something on him. We can’t turn him in. But I guess Alex is concerned that I I don’t know. Anyway, they end up going upstairs, and they’re having this argument. And and I guess what we’re meant to believe is that they mercifully left him down there. And, of course, again, he’s acting like he’s enfeebled and all beat up and whatever. So they go upstairs. But as they’re preparing to leave, the guy pops up again and shoots Alex, and this time, Alex really is dead. Rocky somehow gets around him and runs out the door, and she runs, I don’t know, maybe half a block down the street. And she turns around, like, to taunt him, which, again, god, she’s dumb.
Todd: She’s like, you’re worthless out here.
Craig: Yeah. Yeah.
Clip: And and the dog.
Craig: And then the dog. And so the dog comes out and starts, chasing her. And she runs, and she gets to her car, but the dog catches her right at the car and pulls her backpack off of her. And so, you know, the dog’s out there. Again, it’s a very Cujo moment. She needs to get the backpack. And, again, I’m sitting there like, you know what? There’s nobody else around. Start the car, pull right up to the backpack, open the door a hair, and pull it in.
Clip: Like Yeah.
Craig: But instead, she devises this genius plan where she pulls down the back seat so that that it’s open to the trunk. And then she gets a bungee Todd, and she pops the trunk from the inside. And she lures the dog in. And as soon as the dog is in, she pulls the bungee cord to slam the trunk and then pushes the seat back up. So the dog is trapped in the trunk. That actually was very smart. But this is a rottweiler, and it pretty easily pushes the front seat down. And they have you know, they they fight, and she punches the dog. And, eventually, you know, with one of the bungee cords, gets him restrained so that, he’s kind of out of the picture. She gets out to get the backpack, but blind guy is out there having had plenty of time to find them, following the dog’s barking, and he knocks her out. And then we’re back to the opening scene. He is now dragging her down, the street in broad daylight by the hair, and, he gets her back in the house. It it seems like everything is lost, but she sees I don’t remember if if it’s on Alex or if it’s just in
Todd: something Alex’s hand.
Craig: Yeah.
Todd: Dead hand. Yeah.
Craig: He’s got the remote. And so she gets the remote, and she pushes the panic button, and all of the alarms start, going off. And the blind guy starts just blindly shooting at her, but, he eventually runs out of bullets, and she gives him a crowbar to the head. Again, this would definitely be a killing blow. I mean, there’s just just no question, about it. And and he, yeah, he falls into the basement.
Todd: Yeah. And then we get a a final shot of him, you know, just staring straight up but not moving, and that closes. And then from there on, it’s it’s, her and her sister in the airport waiting to get on their plane for Chicago for California. And she happens to see a news report come on the screen and it turns out it’s about this blind guy. And we find out that, he indeed survived. Mhmm. And basically, the story is that he was his house was broken into. He managed to fend off and kill the intruders and miraculously he’s alive and he reported that nothing was taken from him.
Craig: Right.
Todd: So it’s clearly setting us up for a sequel Sure. Or just that sort of shock ending that, that he got away. Yeah. And apparently, there is a sequel in the works.
Craig: Oh, yeah. I saw that.
Todd: And Sam Ramey said it’s only the best idea for a sequel he’s ever heard in his life. No kidding. So I’m really kind of interested to see what the premise will be for the sequel.
Craig: Well, there had to be a sequel. It made, like, a $140,000,000. I mean, it was a huge, huge success, which is kinda surprising because it doesn’t really seem I mean, it seems I don’t wanna say it’s run of the mill because it’s really well made. But, and I remember the ad campaign, but it’s not a sequel. It’s not a superhero movie. You know? It’s not a remake. Yeah. And so those, you know, these types of genre films don’t typically do that well. I I suppose I’m glad that it did. You know, maybe that paves the way for more bigger budget. I mean, I think that they shot it for, like, less than $1,000,000 or something like that. Right?
Todd: But 10 less than 10 Less than 10. 29,000,000. Gotcha.
Craig: Okay. So, you know, that’s that’s pretty big budget for for a horror film. But, you know, it it made its money back in spades. And, so, of course, of course, there will be a sequel. Yeah. I don’t know. It’ll be interesting to see if they I I mean, I I can only imagine that they’ll bring Stephen Lang back, you know, the guy who played the blind man, but whether whether they’ll continue the Jane Levy, plot or not, it’ll be interesting to see. I don’t know. It it seems like you’re you’re a little bit lukewarm about this movie.
Todd: I I am. And I think, like I said, I think it just morally, I felt like it was so problematic even with the twist in the middle of the guy. I mean, okay, so he’s a bad guy. Right? But that’s not why they went in there.
Clip: Right.
Todd: You know? They went in there to like rip off a disabled blind guy who lost his daughter and take all of the money that he got in the settlement. You know? And he lives in this terrible, you know, he’s the only house in this neighborhood. It just seems uber pathetic. And, you know, to me, the whole movie was setting up this classic EC Comics type scenario. You know, we’ve I’ve talked about this before. Yeah. You know, EC Comics used to be like like Tales from the Crypt and they, Well, they had a whole line of comics called Craig suspense stories and shock suspense stories, which were exactly like this. It would be some crime thing that had a twist at the end. And usually it was, these criminals, they have this perfect crime in mind, but then somehow, somewhere there’s an accident or things aren’t what they seem or the person that they’re trying to rip off is stronger than they realize, or somehow gets the upper hand and there’s always this ironic twist at the end. And so, it felt like for most of the movie, up until we find out this guy’s no, you know, Angel either, that that was that was what we were getting. You know, and I think, honestly, I would have I don’t know. It’s not that I you can make whatever movie you want. You know? I don’t care. But I think I would have enjoyed that movie just a little bit better. I would have enjoyed seeing
Craig: Get their comeuppance. Yeah. Yeah.
Todd: Yeah. I get it. You know, them get their comeuppance and not not at the end be so like, oh, it’s such a happy story. They she got out with all the money that she stole and was able to give her daughter a better life.
Craig: There was a little collateral damage. No big deal. Yeah.
Todd: You know, it’s just this this this poor woman who is caught downstairs is killed. Her friends are killed. She has this dirty money.
Craig: Yeah. I get it.
Todd: Todd me, it’s it’s not enough that the guy, you know, did some terrible things too. It’s just not enough. Yeah.
Craig: I get it. I mean, I I see where you’re coming from. I I I guess I I guess I was just willing to accept that they were all kind of horrible people. I I mean, frankly Yeah. I was rooting for Alex. Alex seemed like the nice guy. I wanted him to somehow save the day, or I wanted him to somehow redeem himself and Rocky in some way. And and you don’t get that. Instead, he just dies. And and maybe that’s what they were going for. Maybe they were going a little dark, and and I’m fine with the it didn’t bother me. I I found the movie to be suspenseful. I didn’t think it was amazing. It’s not one of the best movies I’ve ever seen, but, there was some good suspense. I thought that the filmmaking itself was was top notch. You know? It was it was really good. So I I would recommend this, and I think that this is a movie, and maybe, you know, the box office results, you know, are are evidence of this. But I think that this is a movie that’s accessible to a pretty wide audience. In fact, my my partner is a big fan of crime shows, and I’m really not. But I I watch them with him every once in a while, and and this reminded me a lot of something like Criminal Minds. Oh, yeah.
Todd: For sure.
Craig: You know, without all of the boring officers talking to each other. You know? Just just the psychos. You know? But it it reminded me a lot of that. And and those shows, of course, are hugely popular, so I could see why this would be appealing to a a pretty broad audience. Overall, I I thought it was it was pretty Todd. You know, a lot better than some of the stuff we watch, and, I would feel a lot more comfortable recommending this to someone rather than something like Tokyo Gore Police, which I would almost be embarrassed to even post on my Facebook
Todd: page. You know, if if we’d had an alligator vagina in this movie, I might have liked this
Clip: a little bit more.
Todd: Well, thank you again for listening to another episode. If you enjoyed it, please share it with a friend. You can find us on iTunes, Google Play, and Stitcher. You can also find us on Facebook, or you can like our page and share it with a friend, and let us know what you thought of this film as well. Also, head over to 2 guys dot redfortynet.com, where we have all of our cast episodes posted as well as the occasional written movie review each week. Until next time, I’m Todd.
Craig: And I’m Craig.
Todd: With 2 Guys and a Chainsaw.