It Comes at Night (2017) SPOILER Review by: Tristan Bunn
Every so often, a film comes along that splits audiences down the middle. It can even split critics and audiences apart with one side praising it while the other condemns it to the five dollar bin in an Idaho K-Mart, never to return. This year’s It Comes at Night seems to have done both. Trey Edward Shults’ claustrophobic “horror” film currently holds an 87% critic rating on Rotten Tomatoes, but holds a 44% audience score on the same website. Personally, I don’t put weight into a film’s tomato rating. In fact, it makes me sick that films come out and are given a number on a website that they will never escape, but that’s a topic for a different day. Today, I’m simply reviewing It Comes at Night. The film has been out for over a week now, so I’m going to discuss the film in depth, including SPOILERS.
You want my non-spoiler review? It’s a masterpiece of filmmaking. Terror, paranoia, and remarkable work from cast and crew are here for you to see. It gets my perfect score of an A+. If you haven’t seen it then go do so. Just don’t go in expecting a typical horror movie because the audiences who went in wanting that left disappointed. I understand that, but this is a moving and powerful film. I need to discuss spoilers to do the film justice so this is your last warning. SPOILERS AHEAD! If you haven’t seen the film then please stop reading, go watch it, then come back and see what you think. Here we go!
SPOILERS:
It Comes at Night is not your typical horror film. Many people would be reluctant to call it horror at all. I am not one of those people. I believe this film embodies true terror. I love a good monster movie, ghost story, or creature feature. However, those films very rarely terrify me or get under my skin, that is unless they’re carrying a deeper meaning under the surface like most of the great horror pictures do, currently more than ever before. My favorite sub-genre of horror has always been home invasion. Something or someone invading the one place you are supposed to be protected from the outside world. Your home? Yes, your home…but also your mind.
It Comes at Night is, to put it incredibly basic, a home invasion film in the beginning. We follow Paul, played to perfection by Joel Edgerton, watching over his wife (Sarah) and son (Travis) in a house that has only one entrance. Something has happened in the world. Travis’ grandfather has grown sick or become infected with whatever it is the world or this family seems to be fighting. Paul makes the decision to put him down. He has to, right? He must protect his family…even if that means sacrificing a member of his family that endangers the rest. The film opens with the very dilemma that will plague the family in the finale. However, it isn’t much of a dilemma in the opening. It’s just what has to be done.
This is one of the brilliant pieces to It Comes at Night: the autocracy that Paul commands with. He’s not a power-hungry man. He’s just a father who wants to protect his wife and son at all costs. He has very strict and clear rules. Stay together when you leave the house, the one entrance stays locked at all times, and most importantly to Paul: never go out at night. These rules seem to have kept his family safe up to this point. We have no idea what has happened in the world or what this sickness is because it doesn’t matter. The film carries shades of The Road throughout (another post-apocalyptic masterpiece). Whatever is going on is already happening. Dwelling on it won’t change anything. Shults is fully aware he will immediately lose audiences that want to be spoon fed information. I say good riddance as well.
Eventually there is commotion from the room outside the door one night. Paul and family wake up and go to the room to find Will, a man who has broken in searching for food for his own family. As the audience, we are in the minds of Paul’s family. We only see and know what they see and know. This has been done before, but this is the remarkable piece of the film that I adore and that many audiences want. We, the audience, are not God. We don’t see everything. We know what Paul’s family knows, which makes us even more invested in their journey and their pain. Paul questions Will about his family and learns they have food…or so Will says. Will does indeed have a family and Paul takes them in. This is where the film begins to unravel.
A lot of people seemed to think this was going to be a “monster in the woods” film. I can completely understand that. Instead, It Comes at Night explores paranoia. We’ve let strangers into our home, our safe zone. We don’t know if they can be trusted. We question every word out of their mouths. We question every action. This builds up inside Paul and the audience until it boils over. Will arriving at Paul’s home has changed everything. They already wear gas masks to avoid whatever virus this may be, but now they’re attempting to trust strangers. Will’s story doesn’t always add up and we see the internal struggle Paul is going through. This can also be chalked up to Joel Edgerton’s masterful performance. I have loved Edgerton for a long time, but this is one of his finest pieces. He embodies Paul completely. The entire cast does tremendous work here, particularly Kelvin Harrison Jr. (Travis.)
The film follows Paul and his family getting to know Will and his family. As the tension slowly starts to burn through our veins, Travis continues to have terrifying dreams. This is not the horror cliche using dreams instead of real scares. The dreams are creepy, but Shults never tries to trick us. One of my favorite critics, Chris Stuckmann, noted that Shults changes the aspect ratio every time we enter a dream Travis is having. I caught this in the theater as well, which I thought was fantastic. Some people think this takes the tension away from the film because we know it isn’t real. I disagree, because we see the paranoia within Travis. These dreams are an indication of something sinister looming. They get more and more intense and he can’t seem to shake them. I thought it was a beautiful touch for us to see Paul’s struggle with paranoia through real conversations, while viewing Travis’ paranoia and fear boiling up within him as he sleeps.
Ultimately, Travis wakes up from a nightmare to accompany Will’s son back to his room after finding him on the floor. He also finds the red door (the one that should stay closed because Paul has the only set of keys) is wide open and their dog is suffering behind it. The dog took off in the woods earlier in the film and vanished, as you know if you’ve seen the film. Paul and Will put the dog down, but these brings more questions. What nearly killed the dog? Why was Will and Kim’s son not in their bed? Who opened the door? Is someone sick? We don’t get all of our answers…because neither do our characters.
Paul separates the families and the climax arrives when he believes Will’s son is sick. Travis touched the child’s hand so that would make him ill as well. They engage in a brawl outdoors that results in Paul murdering Will’s entire family, his child included. This is a horrifying, brutal, and spectacular scene to watch. Paul literally has to go to the furthest lengths imaginable to protect his family. He has to murder a child. Paul and his wife then discover that their son, Travis, has in fact been infected with this disease that has plagued the family and possibly the world. Travis’ mother reassures him that everything will be fine.
The final shot of the film is Paul and his wife, Sarah, staring at each other in the kitchen, knowing what they should do…but can they go through with it? This last frame is a brilliant finale and a remarkable ending to a remarkable film.
Shults’ writing and directing continuously push this film out of its genre and into absolute greatness. I’m shocked at some of the response this film has gotten. One of the main complaints seems to be that we, the audience, don’t get any answers. What killed the dog? Who opened the door? How was the child infected or was he infected? What about Travis? Was Will lying about his brother?
As I noted earlier, we are not God. As an audience, we only know what Paul knows. Doesn’t that make it terrifying?!
Would these audiences have been happier if the film reveals that there’s a big blue monster in the woods that eats dogs and infects humans? It might have pleased some people…but it would have drained all tension from the film. The tension mounts through (say it with me again) PARANOIA. The human psyche is crumbling in front of us. Scratch that. OUR psyche is crumbling. Over the course of 90 minutes, we are the characters and we question everything. I’m sure Paul wanted answers. But he doesn’t get them! Shults has purposefully removed any answers from the film so we can take this journey with the characters. I mentioned this earlier in the review, but that is what makes the paranoia and tension mount.
Humans are scarier than any monster. Paul fears for his family’s life. He is so protective of them, that he rules with an iron fist. There are rules in place to protect them. He believes what he is doing is the best way to protect them, and it might be. So this brings us to a burning complaint or question many people have with the film.
What the hell comes at night? Perhaps the marketing can mislead people into believing something is coming at night to destroy the family or change their lives. Oh wait…..
..THAT HAPPENS!!!
This is just my personal take on the title. “It Comes at Night.” What comes at night? Another human. Another man. Will comes at night. When we open on Paul, Travis, and Sarah, they seem to have adapted to this autocracy Paul has built. With the exception of having to put down the grandfather, they seem to be doing okay. This all changes when Will tries to break into the house one night. Everything for the family flips when Will comes at night. The director has also said the title is a metaphor. Perhaps just meaning danger, paranoia, and betrayal. However, in my eyes this all begins when Will shows up one evening claiming to seek refuge for his own family. Paul takes them in with promises of food. He gets his food, but he also gets something he didn’t ask for.
This is another aspect of this film that I find so brilliant. There isn’t a clear antagonist. When Will first arrives, we assume he might be a villain. No. He’s just a man trying to survive, it seems. When the climax begins, Will doesn’t threaten to kill Paul. He is simply trying to get his wife and baby out of that house with a fair share of the food. He just wants to leave. Paul can’t let them. Does this make Paul the antagonist? No. It makes them human. The film constantly tears apart the human brain and examines how choices we make can affect the rest of our lives (particularly in an infected apocalyptic wasteland.)
Was Will’s son sick? We don’t know for sure. If so then he must have infected Travis, right? Maybe not. Maybe it was the other way around. We don’t get these answers because the characters don’t have the answers. Another big complaint is Travis’ dream sequences. I mentioned that the director is never trying to fool anyone. Travis’ dreams seem to be an indication of something sinister approaching, a demise that he won’t soon escape. Could the dreams be a symptom of the virus? Possibly. Could the lifestyle be catching up with him? Sure. Is there any way out of this hell? Unfortunately, no. We see that there’s no way out in the last frame. Does Paul kill his own son to protect himself and his wife? That would be the logical thing to do and would fall in line with his lifestyle thus far. But without his son, why should he live? It’s a haunting final scene that is still burning under my skin.
It Comes at Night is a masterpiece of modern horror. It’s important to remember that while monsters and creature features are tons of fun, it is the human psyche that serves as the darkest demon among us. The human mind, and the thoughts it can create, is with us every day. Depression, grief, paranoia, and fear are always present in the back of our skulls, waiting for an opportunity to pounce. There is no villain in It Comes at Night. There is only circumstance. And so the issues must be dealt with. A sane person might handle these situations gracefully. Perhaps Paul does handle them gracefully. However, the world these characters live in is no longer for the faint of heart. It is not for the weak minded. Only the strong survive. But fear is powerful. Once it grabs a hold of you, it doesn’t want to let go. Fear latches onto Paul and he does what needs to be done, even if he’s not exactly pulling the strings. These people are prisoners to their own mind…and that’s the most sinister monster of them all.
Grade: A+
