‘Don’t Breathe is terse in mood and appearance’. Photograph via Sony Pictures.
If the instructive title doesn’t give it away, then the grey-toned, dim-lit cinematography that sends most of the movie skulking and stalking through a dilapidated Detroit house does: Don’t Breathe is terse in mood and appearance. In fact, the home invasion thriller adopts a tone that evolves from grim and gritty to unceasingly unsettling. As he proved with the 2013 Evil Dead remake that marked his first full-length directorial effort, filmmaker Fede Alvarez dwells in the realm in dark tales – and prefers his imagery to match his narratives.
Helming as well as co-writing with his regular collaborator Rodo Sayagues, Alvarez conjures up his latest sinister story courtesy of the exploits of a troupe of rebellious Michigan citizens burgling houses as a means to amass enough cash to blow out of town. Money (Daniel Zovatto, TV’s Fear the Walking Dead) thinks heading to California will be better than hanging around the crumbling city, Rocky (Jane Levy, Suburgatory) is determined to save her younger sister from their mean-spirited mother, and Alex (Dylan Minnette, Goosebumps) is simply keen to follow his unrequited crush. After deciding upon a final robbery in a downtrodden neighbourhood – some willingly, others reluctantly – the gang embark upon one last job before their big escape.
Three thieves enter the rundown abode looking for a rumoured financial windfall – and one visually impaired homeowner (Stephen Lang, Into the Badlands) fights back, with his vicious dog in tow. The trio is unprepared for their unwelcoming host, who proves not only an army veteran troubled by a family tragedy, but a formidable, resourceful, instinct-driven foe. Indeed, Alvarez and Sayagues’ chief narrative achievement springs from successfully aligning the audience’s interests with the posse of pilfering perpetrators over their ostensible victim, and subsequently redefining the expected balance of power in the process. Though the intruders invade a space they’re not supposed to, they don’t instill panic in their blind adversary; instead, they’re chased and terrorised by him.
Accordingly, a constrained cat-and-mouse game comprises the majority of the feature; however, as notable as the film’s major subversion of its familiar scenario is – and as increasingly unpleasant as many of the twists that follow are as well –it’s the manner in which Alvarez thrusts the tale onto the screen that makes Don’t Breathe a memorable addition to the horror canon. Thanks to the resourceful efforts of director of photography Pedro Luque (ABCs of Death 2), every frame oozes with unease, whether peering down on the action from above or roaming through the main setting’s corridors and crawlspaces. Editors Eric L. Beason (The Librarians), Louise Ford (The Witch) and Gardner Gould (first assistant on The Bronze) bestow the movie with the perfect pace to maximise tension, ensuring that no moment or potential shock is wasted. And in an offering that’s just as acoustically unnerving and uncomfortable, the sound department match their visual counterparts in their anxiety-inducing artistry.
What results is a supremely well-crafted film made by a technical team who’ve clearly pondered long and hard over just what is and isn’t seen and heard – and how their choices can most effectively and efficiently perturb the watching audience. The same care extends to the feature’s version of a demon, with Lang giving the movie the muscle and fearsome bulk that its purposefully slight story lacks. If Alvarez’s stylistic preferences keep Don’t Breathe both creeping and creepy, Lang sends it jumping into relentlessly intense territory. That the affable-enough Levy, Minnette and Zovatto are left scurrying around him, both physically and in their serviceable performances, almost feels fitting.
Rating: 3 stars out of 5
Don’t Breathe
Director: Fede Alvarez
USA, 2016, 88 mins
Release date: September 1
Distributor: Sony
Rated: MA
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