Intensity 🩸🩸🩸 out of 🩸🩸🩸🩸🩸
Directed by Michael Sarnoski
Written by Michael Sarnoski, John Krasinski, and Bryan Woods
A Quiet Place: Day One scales up the franchise experience in a big way, but it still delivers a wonderfully intimate story. Lupita Nyong’o and Joseph Quinn make for an improbable but appealing pair that radiates empathy amongst the chaos of an alien invasion apocalypse in this tightly wound prequel.
Some fans, including a couple of the critics at The Scariest Things, questioned the need for another Quite Place movie. What’s the point? Didn’t we already see the alien opening salvo at the beginning of A Quiet Place Part II? Further concerns arose when it was announced that there would be a primarily different cast and crew this time. The track record for similar projects in their third chapters is spotty, at best. What new themes could possibly be brought to the screen, given that the premise from the first two films had been well played out?
I am pleased to report that this movie is an outstanding feature effort. It works well both as a prequel and a stand-alone movie. You could watch this movie, having not seen the first two movies. You won’t be left trying to catch up. Michael Sarnoski takes the reins from Creator/Director John Krasinski, who moves into a writer and producer’s role for this prequel. Sarnoski was a curious selection to helm this film, but you can see from his award-winning previous feature, Pig, that he knows how to spin a quiet and powerful personal story. Furthermore, Paramount has bolstered this film with a suitably good budget ($67 million) and terrific actors in all the key roles.
The Cast:
- Lupita Nyong’o plays Samira (Sam), a woman slowly dying of cancer when armageddon arrives.
- Joesph Quinn plays Eric, a stranded law school student overwhelmed by the recent events.
- Alex Wolff plays Reuben, Sam’s earnest and bedraggled hospice nurse, who has a crush on Sam.
- Djimon Hounsou plays Henri, a survivor who quickly assesses the dangers of the new alien threat.
- Schnitzel and Nico play Frodo, Sam’s support cat and brave observer of the unfolding invasion.
A SHORT SUMMARY OF A QUIET PLACE: DAY ONE
Samira is a poet living out her final days battling cancer in a worn-down Bronx hospice care facility. Her doting nurse, Reuben, coaxes her into attending a Manhattan concert. He believes that getting out of the hospital should do her some good. Disappointment sets in on Sam when it turns out that the concert appears to be a puppet show. She leaves the performance early to explore but is rounded up back to the hospice bus when the residents are recalled due to a city-wide emergency.
They don’t know it yet, but the world is at a hinge moment. Death Angels rain down from the sky like meteors. These sightless monstrosities have a highly attuned sense of hearing, and soon, the entire city is overcome with death and destruction courtesy of these creatures. An explosion rocks the bus and knocks Sam unconscious. Henri rescues Sam, reviving her in the puppet theater. With fellow survivors like Reuben and Henri, Sam tries to get a reading on what is happening. In the ensuing hours, the City becomes isolated, and Sam decides she will brave the dangers outside and go to Patty’s, a pizza joint in Harlem near and dear to her.
Before she can depart, death angels arrive at the theater, and she flees with Frodo into the ash-covered streets. Helicopters overhead announce that all people should head for the ferries as it appears these invaders apparently can’t swim. She joins a mass exodus of people heading to the ferries, but all it takes is one slight noise, and the aliens descend on the helpless evacuees.
Frodo discovers Eric struggling to escape from a flooded subway tunnel. The remarkable cat returns to Sam with Eric in tow. Sam prefers to be alone. Eric, however, is lost and desperate and persists in helping Sam back to her apartment. He is alone in the City, a recent Law School attendee with no loved ones nearby. Together, the couple (and cat) head out for the last slice of pizza in Harlem. Their trip is fraught with perils, but this has become a Quixotic pilgrimage through monster-ridden territory.
EVALUATION OF A QUIET PLACE: DAY ONE
In many ways, this movie strongly resembles a Romero zombie movie. This isn’t so much about the monsters as it is about the environment that the monsters have created. This idea rang true for the first two movies, but it also rings true here. The rules of the world have changed. Making noise could kill you. Going outside could kill you. Staying inside could trap you in place… and kill you.
With the environment now set in the very noisy confines of New York City, the silence, as the cliche goes, is deafening. Once again, see this movie in a big theater with a big crowd. With most of the movie working under the premise of silence=safety, you become quite aware of the ambient sounds in the movie… and rustling popcorn, slurping straws, and shifting seats. It is perhaps A Quite Places’ great gift to cinemagoers. The movie puts you in the environment. Moreover, it makes the jump scares natural, without any musical cues. This is a strong Oscar candidate for sound editing.
Lupita Nyong’o has become a genre movie stalwart. With Us, Little Monsters, and now A Quiet Place: Day One, she has cemented herself as a top-shelf scream queen. Most encouragingly, it shows that the studios are ready to put Oscar-winning actresses at the top of the call sheet for horror movies. That she is a back actress makes this even more encouraging, and the results of $180 Million in worldwide earnings after two weeks prove that Nyong’o can bring in big box office numbers when many tentpole features are struggling to get an audience.
Joseph Quinn, known by many for his stint as Eddie Munson in Stranger Things, is a bit of a revelation in A Quiet Place: Day One. His arrival in the second act lets the story sing. Eric’s devotion to a woman he meets on the street clicks. Eric draws out the backstory from Sam. These are natural performances, and both actors squeeze real emotional power into what is effectively a survival tale.
The unconventional structure of the film keeps the audience on edge. Unlike many movies that rely on the second act for connective tissue and exposition, A Quite Place: Day One throttles the action midway into the first and the bulk of the second act. The third act still has some big set pieces, but this act is where the soul of the story and the narrative take place. I found this structure and the editing rewarding, and the unexpected plot pacing kept me guessing throughout the movie.
I think a good comp for this movie is 28 Days Later, in tone, drama, and character development. That is high praise. 28 Days Later is in my top 10 horror movies of all time. This doesn’t quite get there, but it isn’t far behind. It is on my watch list for the top 10 horror movies of 2024, though.
CONCLUSION
This film franchise solidifies its reputation as a world builder. This prequel proved that you can take brand new stories with wholly different characters and place them in the Quiet Place Universe and succeed. Everything still felt fresh. This is what the Alien and Predator franchises have been attempting to do, with mixed success. This is not a franchise that clumsily cranks out clones of the previous films. A Quiet Place Part II was a full extension of the first movie. Day One takes the same conditions and asks, “What if we apply the exact same rules to a major metropolitan area?” The great thing is that this movie still remembers that it is about the characters IN that environment. This is the proper use of a cinematic sandbox.
There are a few logic gaps, though. I loved Frodo. That cat was pure magic. However, I am sure I was not the only audience member thinking: That cat is a ticking time bomb. One meow, and it will be game over. I’m sure Sarnoski was aware of this feline liability and milked that cat’s presence to amplify the tension. I love my dog, but even as a reasonably quiet dog, he would undoubtedly be the end of me in the world of A Quiet Place.
I also could not fathom why people would be willing to travel in huge herds towards presumed safety. One cough or stumble from someone near you will trigger the death angels. The dramatic overhead shot of the hordes of shuffling refugees reminded me of a nature show like Blue Planet, with humans acting as the sardine bait ball and the death angels playing the role of the swordfish. If you have seen these documentaries, you know that the sardines try to use safety in numbers, but they all get eaten in the end.
A Quiet Place: Day One is in wide release nationwide. Due to its current success at the box office, it should still be in the cinemas for a few more weeks. It is worth seeing on the big screen with a big audience. The MPAA designated the film with a PG-13 rating, but this is a very intense movie. Like its predecessors, it sets the standard for implementing a scary PG-13 thrill ride.