Round the twist
KNOCK AT THE CABIN 15
★★★★
AFILM’S marketing campaign usually relies on its stars, not its director. But, in a notable departure from the template, the Knock At The Cabin poster features the backs of four unidentified actors. “M Night Shyamalan” is the only name aimed at drawing punters into cinemas.
Since everyone started telling everyone else about the final reveal in The Sixth
Sense back in 1999, the director has become his own brand.
His films Unbreakable, Signs and The Village ended with more twists, all of them forcing viewers to reappraise everything that happened earlier in the film. By now, we are ready for him. And, in Knock At The Cabin, he keeps us guessing from the opening scene.
In a wood, a little girl (Kristen Cui) is collecting grasshoppers when man mountain Dave Bautista appears in a dangerously tight shirt.
“I don’t talk to strangers,” says the kid when Big Dave bends down to chat. But the charming hulk wins her round.
Is he going to murder her? Is he going to help her? Will those shirt buttons hold when he finally stands up?
The questions keep coming as Dave gets the kid to spill about her two gay dads and the holiday cabin they are renting nearby.
It gets more tense after the girl runs to the cabin and the big man rolls up with three companions (Rupert Grint, Nikki Amuka-bird and Abby Quinn) holding some medievallooking weapons.
After smashing their way in, they tie up Daddy Eric ( Jonathan Groff ) and Daddy Andrew (Ben Aldridge).
Bautista claims to be a school teacher called Leonard and politely explains that all four have all been drawn to the cabin by the same apocalyptic vision. After apologising profusely, he offers an ultimatum – one member of their family must commit suicide or the world will end.
Are they prophets, conmen or nutcases? Shyamalan keeps the tension simmering away until his final frames.
I’m saying nothing.
The teacher says a family member must commit suicide or the world will end