A Potpourri of Vestiges Review
By Anirban Lahiri
Featured in IMDb Critic Reviews
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| Don't Breathe (2016) - By Fede Alvarez |
In the last
twenty years, with the slow encroachment of the viewing space by the TV screen, always increasing in width, thriller replaced the romantic as the ubiquitous genre. Today, in
the youth of globalization, thriller with its characteristic elements - accelerated pace (i.e., continually decreasing
shot-duration in the same scene), Close Ups quickly stitched to Long and Extreme Long Shots, action jerks, discontinuity and war drum-beat rhythm - have
become so important that a film’s success is defined by that. Fede Alvarez’s chamber thriller successfully uses these tropes to carve out a tight, and
unpredictable, high-strung midnight drama, enacted by four people and a dog
(well, one dies in the first thirty minutes of the film, and replaced by a
muted, kidnapped girl who also dies within ten minutes of her introduction in
to the film. So, practically it is a film played out by three major characters, two absent or dead souls, and a dog), in a cloistered bungalow on the suburb.
Our Rating: 7.5
IMDb Ratings: 7.8
IMDb Ratings: 7.8
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| A Still from Don't Breathe |
Rocky, Alex
and Money are three thieves who break in homes for petty sums. When they find
out a rich, blind, army veteran staying in the suburb alone, in a secluded
bungalow, they decide to barge in, at night. Little do these amateur burglars
know how an experienced US Army officer functions, despite his blindness. Money
(played by Daniel Zovatto) is killed quickly. The film practically begins at
his death in the hands of the blind man. What happens after that puts us in a
roller coaster drive for the next fifty minutes of the film.
The blind
man has a dog. A fierce, protector, one. It is always amazing to see other animals playing sharply
besides their human masters, in films. The dog, the overall architecture of
scenes with its magical sheen of alternate orange and blue light zones, the
claustrophobic violence that keeps us taut in the seats, almost no background
music to spoil the mood – these adrenaline elements build the structure of fear
and unpredictability with the first death in the house.
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| A Still from Don't Breathe |
Special
credit goes to the Cinematographer Pedro Luque Briozzo , from the State Film
School, Uruguay. The typical Latin American mood enhancers that we have seen in
the films shot by Lubezki, Navarro, Prieto or Miranda – saturated colors, play of
the opposites, classical composition plans enhanced, separation of fore, middle
and background like a visual engineer, precisely, with geometry, tones and
colors – are vividly present in Luque’s work too. Cinematography, editing and
sound design build up the characters caught between four walls, without much
past history shown, or needed.
As student of Cognitive Psychology, I have some knowledge about how blind men perceive reality. Although there are subtle, and sometimes gross, differences among blind men in interacting with the world out there (and the differences are more pronounced between the congenital blind and blind at mature age), there are logical similarities. If vision is absent, other senses go on hyper-drive. I have seen blind persons moving with unbelievable agility, in all types of spaces. Fed Alvarez meticulously used this fact to etch out enhanced reality out of a fantasy space. The story unrolls at night, under dim light, and sometimes in total darkness. The blind man, brought to life by the refined movements of Stephen Lang, makes it unpredictable. We fail to guess who will win.
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| A Still from Don't Breathe |
The
actors were all in controlled role play. The credit for that goes to the Director and
the Cinematographer. Without doubt, this is a Director’s film. There was not much
left for the actors to improvise.
This film
is an interesting case-study of how a high-pitched thriller may be made within a
single location, in a continuous stretch of time. Important for both cinephiles
and filmmakers, Don’t Breathe is
ready to set fire to the screen.
Go and catch
it in the cinemas!
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| A Still from Don't Breathe |
Readers, please feel free to share your views/opinions in the comment box below. As always your feedback is highly appreciated!
References:
Don't Breathe (2016) Trailer (YouTube)
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