Part 4 of The Captain’s FAVORITE time of year is up next with… DON’T BREATHE!
It’s time to play the game of NAME THAT GENERIC BLONDE ACTRESS!
Jane Levy is the star of Don’t Breathe but god help me if I actually remember her from anything. And nowadays with all these blonde actresses popping up in films like this, I can’t tell anyone apart. It’s like Face Blindness kicks in whenever one of them pops up.
Is she from Lights Out? Wait, maybe she’s the one from It Follows. No? Though funny enough most pictures you’ll find of her she has red hair. Making her look a lot like Emma Stone. Who ironically, now has blonde hair.
Even after looking at Jane Levy’s IMDB page I’m still drawing blanks. I guess she was in the Evil Dead remake. Though she has been in two things with Peter Stormare, so she can’t be too bad, right?
Don’t Breathe has been getting a ton of hype and praise. And with most horror films that come to theaters, January is usually the dumping ground for shittastic films. So your options are pretty thin if you plan on seeing a scary film on October, aka horror month.
But does Don’t Breathe live up to all the hype?
Yes and no.
I actually wouldn’t categorize this as horror, more of a taut thriller. I also can’t be the only one to point this out but this reminded me a lot of Panic Room. The characters kind of look the same… sometimes shots move a lot like they do in Panic Room…
Not a slight against the film, just something that stuck out to me.
I really really enjoyed this film. Casting Stephen Lang as the blind vet with no qualms about shooting you in the face was spot on. Hell, you could almost twist this slightly and make him the protagonist.
One thing I do have to point out besides the similarities with Panic Room, is the striking similarities to another film called Intruders. In it, three thieves break into a house of an agoraphobic girl, but she isn’t exactly helpless or all that innocent. Long story short, she kills everyone, also keeping a dark secret in the cellar.
I would say spoilers ahead for Don’t Breathe, but seeing as the trailers for this film basically showed you everything, no need for the warning.
Our main characters are Rocky, her shitbag boyfriend Money and her hopelessly in love best friend Alex.
Rocky needs money, she has a daughter and their living situation isn’t the greatest. They live in Detroit and living in a city dying has more than its hardships. So the three rob houses with the help of Alex, whose father works setting up security systems. Which means he has keys and codes for all the houses and alarms.
Just stealing shoes, jewels and other minor things like laptops isn’t getting them the pay day they want or need. They don’t take cash, seeing as that carries with it a more severe crime if they get caught. But after getting a tip about a loaded blind vet living in the middle of nowhere, the three jump at this once in a lifetime opportunity.
Stephen Lang’s character doesn’t really have a name, he’s just the creepy blind vet. His daughter was killed in a hit and run, winning him a giant settlement. The one responsible was just a young teen who the court went easy on, setting her free.
So now Stephen Lang lives in this wasteland, a house stuck around a completely empty neighborhood. Just him and his giant vicious dog. A dog so intimidating that it was giving me People Under the Stairs flashbacks.
Rocky and crew have to go around back because Stephen Lang put more than one lock on the front door, ones they don’t have keys for. Locks to either keep people out or keep something in.
They move around back to find Lang’s massive hound waiting for them. Thankfully Alex had some sleepy meats with him. Now they can intrude freely. But the backyard is just as sealed up as the front.
Rocky spots the bathroom window on the second floor they might be able to get into, but she’s the only one small enough to fit, so she goes in alone, disarming the alarm system and letting Money and Alex in.
Now inside they take off their shoes so not to make any unnecessary noise.
They search the house for a safe, but come up empty. Money goes upstairs, finds Lang’s bedroom and concocts a makeshift gas grenade, tossing it into his room.
Thanking the blind vet is in sleep mode like his dog, Money makes as much noise as possible trying to find the safe. The giant lock on the cellar door draws their attention. The lock is too large to cut, and the crowbar isn’t getting the job done either, so Money pulls out his gun.
Seeing they broke and entered with a loaded weapon, Alex freaks out and takes off. Thinking Lang is still asleep, he shoots off the lock.
Just as they’re about to enter the cellar, the blind vet shows up. The thing about being blind, pointing a gun at them doesn’t really have the effect you might want. The blind vet quickly disarms Money, pointing the gun to his head. He asks him if anyone else is there with him. Money lies and gets his head blown off. While all this is happening Rocky is standing beside them, trying her best not to make a sound.
Alex hears the gunshot and runs back inside to find Money dead.
Rocky hides in a closet where the blind vet storms in, revealing the safe, even typing in the code for her. Inside is way more than what they were expecting, instead of a few thousand, it turned out to be a few million.
Money may be dead, but that doesn’t change the reason they’re all there. So Rocky steals the money.
Alex and Rocky almost get away without the blind vet noticing when he discovers their shoes. Now he knows others are in his house.
Thinking they can get out through the cellar, the two creep down, finding the blind vet’s dark secret. He’s been keeping a girl chained up down there. But not just any girl. The driver that killed his daughter.
Not wanting to leave her here, they set her free and make a break for the cellar door to the outside. But what they find is the blind vet waiting for them, armed with Money’s gun.
Of course him being blind, he just fires… um blindly, hitting and killing the lady he had chained up. When he discovers her dead it enrages him. He had plans for her and now he has to start again. She was pregnant. He inseminated her, forcing her to give him another daughter. With her now dead, he needs a replacement. And what better option than Rocky.
Here is where the film kind of falls apart… No, not fall apart exactly, but if this was a true horror film it would have ended with you thinking Alex was dead and with Rocky about to be inseminated. The blind vet vows he’ll let her go after 9 months. And from there, you’d see 9 months have passed. Maybe spend the last 30 minutes with her trying to escape with her new baby.
But instead Alex didn’t die and stopped her insemination. Though Alex only lives long enough just to be convenient to the plot. He gets shot in the back as Rocky escapes out the front door. But she isn’t safe just yet. There’s still that hellhound to deal with.
But stupid dogs are stupid and she manages to get the better of him. Money on the other hand gets the better of her, going back after the bookbag with the cash stashed in it. The blind vet is waiting for her, now it’s back to the love shack!
Rocky manages to set off the alarm, wrestling the gun away from Lang and tossing him down the cellar. She makes a break for it once again with the money and this time she does get away, just as the cops show up.
Later as she and her daughter are about to leave this city forever, they hear on the news that the blind vet lived and pinned everything on the intruders. Even calling him a hero. But Rocky has her money, so screw it.
Very good film, I really wish I had more like this to watch this month. I seem to be hitting the bottom of the barrel now. If I have to watch one more boring, poorly written horror film I might go crazy.
After watching something this good, it’s hard to find anything that compares, everything you watch will just seem lacking in some way. And I’m not even a fan of home invasion films. I find they’re all pretty much the same, but they managed to take the tired out genre and do something new and interesting with it.
Really check this one out, it is well worth your money and time.
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