A qUiet place
The little horror that made a big noise this year.
film extras out 30 July Digital HD 13 AuguSt DVD, BD, 4K extrAS Featurettes
Even with the Transformers movies and other size-matters films on his CV, sound editor Erik Aadahl was intimidated by the size of A Quiet Place. “You are naked,” he said about the experience of making a smaller-scale film without the protection of a multistacked sound mix. But, as director John Krasinski says of that quietude on three short but insight-rich featurettes, “The thing I was most scared of kind of became our superpower.”
Krasinski’s Place did super-powered business with audiences. A $330m haul is a shut-up-and-listen result for a $17m movie, whose lean script did not over-spend on prattle. Nor was there too much advance publicity noise: after all, who knew Jim from The Office (US branch) had it in him?
Even if it takes more than silence to pull audiences in, the minimalist sound mix drives the purpose and punch of Place. “IT’S SOUND!” screams a headline on a newspaper near the
opening, signalling the method by which “indestructible” monsters – who arrived in meteor showers pre-film – have tracked and killed their victims. Noisy environs had no hope; a picture of a wrecked Manhattan is later seen.
Instead of assuming panoramic PoVs on the world’s defeat, writers Bryan Woods, Scott Beck and Krasinski sharpen our attention by focusing on one family’s quiet-mare. Three creatures lurk near the farm house of Lee Abbott (Krasinski), pregnant wife Evelyn (Emily Blunt), daughter Regan (Millicent Simmonds) and son Marcus (Noah Jupe). How they survived thus far is subtly implied, a knowledge of sign language being vital in helping them cope with the limitations on idle natter – Megan is deaf-mute. And we learn fast what happens when silence is broken in a heart-breaking, no-dicking-around prologue.
Settling doorS
At a time when TV remains a challenger to cinema, Krasinski’s setup suggests scale is not the only way to haul audiences into cinemas. A Quiet Place is a minimalist film that works best in a big, insulated context, where its sound field can enfold you without external sonic distractions – assuming you’re not seated among popcorn fiends. Home viewers, make sure the phone’s off the hook.
On-screen, distracting clichés are conspicuously absent. Like stroppy teenagers, horror loves slamming doors; but, in one of many did-younotice-it sonic subtleties here, closing
doors are absent. And although the setup recalls the basement sequence in Spielberg’s War Of The Worlds, Krasinski resists deploying the token survivalist nut-job of many end-of-days films (10 Cloverfield Lane, say). Rejecting info-drop dialogue in favour of in-the-moment immersion, Place is also a test case in how to dodge the excessive-exposition bullet. Everything we need to know is fed through newspaper cuttings, situation, note-boards and performance. The dialogue that does feature lands with clipped clarity, full-stops breaking up subtitles for emphasis. “You. Can. Do. This,” Lee tells Marcus when he sends him to light fireworks as a distraction from what’s happening at home, where Eve faces a nasty injury, breaking waters and some unwanted visitors. ILM’s creatures are a marvel of deadly design, all teeth, screeching, plunging ear canals, pick-axe arms and radar-like flap-heads. Cannily, Krasinski slow-reveals them in Jaws-via-Alien glimpses, serving the suspense and locking us into the family’s limited sensory perspectives.
The pay-off arms the set-pieces – in silo, basement, bath tub – with fantastically focused degrees of intense immediacy. When the feedback suddenly stops on Megan’s hearing aid and we cut silently to an attacking alien, Krasinski shows a raw flair for shredding nerves matched by his flair for shredding emotions. While Hereditary is a horror film about a toxic family, A Quiet Place dares to uphold love as an invitation to – in the words of the Neil Young song Lee and Evelyn dance to – “come a little bit closer”.
Once you’re in position, Krasinski’s prime special effect is his cast. Even if you didn’t know that Wonderstruck’s Simmonds bonded with Jupe over sign language on set, you can guess from their on-screen ease. Krasinski’s clenched features radiate a protective urgency, while Blunt adds another revelatory lead to a career of many: just watch her expression toggle between pain, terror, resignation and resilience after a nail/foot crisis, or break into an already-iconic one-take scream in a bathroom scene that echoes Psycho without suffering by the comparison.
Even when Krasinski delivers full-body creature shots at the climax, we’re no less focused on the wordless exchanges between a frightened but fierce parent and child than we are on the attackers. “In the horror genre, there’s no more powerful special effect than sound,” says Bryan Woods on the extras. Combine his claim with characters you care about, and you’ve got a risk-taking thriller that stands tall in a headline year for horror. Even if it can seem a tad plot-thin when shorn of its initial impact, there’s no doubting the refined ferocity of its handling, or the on-point economy of the final shot: a face, a speaks-volumes expression. No words needed. Kevin Harley
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