KNOCK AT THE CABIN : Tuesday 7th February 2023.

I saw the M Rated 'KNOCK AT THE CABIN' at my local multiplex earlier this week. This American apocalyptic psychological horror film is Directed and written for the screen by M. Night Shyamalan, and is based on the 2018 novel 'The Cabin at the End of the World' by Paul G. Tremblay. Shyamalan's previous film output includes his breakout film with 'The Sixth Sense' in 1999, then 'Unbreakable' in 2000, 'Signs' in 2002, 'The Village' in 2004, then a period of less popular films before his resurgence with 'The Visit' in 2015, 'Split' in 2016, 'Glass' in 2019 and 'Old' in 2021. This film was released last week here in Australia and Stateside too, having seen its Premier screening in New York City on 30th January, garnering generally favourable critical reviews and has so far grossed US$28M from a production budget of US$20M.

The film opens up with young seven year old girl, Wen (Kristen Cui) catching grasshoppers outside a remote cabin in the woods somewhere in rural Pennsylvania. A short time later, a hulking figure of man sidles up and introduces himself as Leonard (Dave Bautista), saying that he wants to be Wen's friend and he helps her catch grasshoppers. Leonard goes on to explain that he needs to see her parents, Eric and Andrew (Jonathan Groff and Ben Aldridge respectively), to help save the world. Soon afterwards three others show up on foot carrying makeshift weapons fashioned out of gardening tools. 

Wen becomes suspicious and flees back to the cabin to alert her parents, who immediately barricade themselves inside. A knock comes to the cabin door with Leonard speaking calmly through the bolted door, urging Andrew and Eric to let them in, saying that no harm will come to them, they just need to talk, about a matter of some urgency. When the parents refuse, Leonard with his three colleagues Redmond (Rupert Grint), Sabrina (Nikki Amuka-Bird) and Adriane (Abby Quinn) forcibly break in, tie up the parents but not before Eric is knocked to the ground in a scuffle and suffers a concussion.

With Eric and Andrew immobilised Leonard and his companions, first introduce themselves giving each a little of their own back story and then he states that they have never met before this day and have no intention of harming the family. However, over the course of the past week, they have been driven by visions and an unknown force to find their family. He goes on to explain that the group have each foreseen an impending apocalypse, in which he claims that the oceans will rise, a pandemic will spread, the sky will fall, and finally, an eternal darkness will envelop the earth. The only way to prevent this from happening is for the family to sacrifice one of their own, but that only they can make that decision. However, they are warned that, if they fail to make a choice, they will survive the apocalypse, but they will be the only survivors and forced to roam the Earth alone. Needless to say Eric and Andrew believe that they are lying and that this attack has been brought on by hatred and delusion.

When the family refuses to make a choice, the group have to sacrifice one of their own. Redmond is the first to go with the group beating him to death with their weapons. Eric, who is concussed, sees a figure of light as Redmond passes away. On the TV, news reports show devastating mega tsunamis caused by undersea earthquakes about seventy miles off the north-west American coast which Leonard calmly states is the start of the apocalypse. 

Andrew comes to realise that he recognised Redmond, whom he believes to be Rory O'Bannon, a homophobic man who had assaulted him years earlier in a bar when Andrew was professing his deep love for Eric. This ultimately led to Rory's imprisonment and six months of surgery rehabilitation for Andrew. Andrew thinks that Rory tracked him down for revenge. Leonard, Sabrina, and Adriane question Andrew's assumption and grapple with their guilt, but still lay claim to the validity of their visions. They reveal that Redmond's death has unleashed the first disaster. The following day, the intruders sacrifice Adriane in the same manner as the family are still indecisive. The next disaster looms, as a deadly flu virus, which is particularly dangerous for children, spreads rapidly across the globe.

Andrew insists that the disasters are coincidental and that the visitors were anticipating a pre-scheduled news broadcast, reporting on old news. Andrew manages to escape, and runs to his car, locking himself inside and retrieves his gun. He is followed by Sabrina, who smashes a side window and stabs Andrew as he shoots at her leading to her fleeing. He frisks Redmond's dead body to locate his wallet and proves to Leonard that he was in fact, as suspected, Rory O'Bannon. Injured from his attack and with their tyres slashed, Andrew believes the four came in a vehicle that must be parked nearby and suggests that they use it to escape. Now armed with a loaded pistol, Andrew and Eric lock Leonard in the bathroom. Sabrina breaks into the house and is shot fatally by Andrew. Leonard tricks Andrew into reentering the bathroom by making him think he escaped through the window, and then overpowers him, stealing the gun. 

Leonard sacrifices Sabrina in the same manner as Redmond and Adriane and the broadcast shows hundreds of aeroplanes literally dropping out of the sky all around the world. Realising their time is nearly up, Leonard leads the three out on to the back deck as the sky begins to darken. Leonard informs them that after his death, they will only have a few minutes to make a decision before slicing his own throat. Upon his death, violent lightning strikes cause numerous spot fires and more planes to crash - the news feed on the TV reports of seven hundred plus planes falling unexplained from the sky. Eric now believes that the events are real, and that the intruders represent the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse - Redmond was 'malice' for his homophobic attitudes and his past beating of Andrew; Sabrina was 'health' for her work as a nurse; Adriane was 'nourishment' for her work as a line cook; and Leonard was 'guidance' for he worked as a teacher. 

Not wanting Wen to grow up alone in a destroyed and desolate world, Eric offers himself as the sacrifice. He notes that during Redmond's sacrifice he saw a vision of Andrew and an adult Wen. Eric feels that their family was chosen to make the sacrifice because their love was pure. Reluctantly, Andrew shoots and kills Eric before lightning strikes, setting the cabin on fire and the five corpses contained therein. Andrew and Wen find the visitors' vehicle with various belongings from each of them that validated their individual stories. They drive to a crowded diner nearby, where they watch news reports confirming that the disasters have subsided. 

'Knock at the Cabin' is not a horror film in the true sense of the genre, as the horror when it does occur, does so off screen and by suggestion. However, as a tense psychological thriller this film more than delivers and demonstrates once again Shyamalan's gift for crafting an intimate taut and tense B-movie. Dave Bautista here plays his role as the gentle giant literally on a mission from God to save the world or die trying, delivers probably his career best performance to date, and the other cast members are all on point too, although I would have liked to see more of Rupert Grint other than the few sparse lines of dialogue he is granted here. The ending when it came, after an efficient one hundred minute run time, felt somewhat rushed, half baked and missing the Director's trademark twist, but that said, this is an effective, emotional and immersive film that shows Shyamalan's visual gift for bringing his audience a thrilling movie. 

'Knock at the Cabin' merits four claps of the Odeon Online clapperboard from a possible five claps. 

-Steve, at Odeon Online-

THE MATRIX RESURRECTIONS : Tuesday 28th December 2021.

'THE MATRIX RESURRECTIONS' which I saw earlier this week is an M Rated American Sci-Fi actioner Directed, Co-Written, Co-Produced by Lana Wachowski and based on characters created by both Lana and Lilly Wachowski, who between them both Wrote and Directed the three previous instalments in this hugely popular film franchise back in 1999 with 'The Matrix', then its first two sequels 'The Matrix Reloaded' and 'The Matrix Revolutions' both released in 2003. Those first three films grossed at the global Box Office US$1.63B off the back of a combined production budget of US$363M, but at the time the Wachowski's were adamant that the franchise ended with 'Revolutions' with the Writers/Directors going on to helm other film and TV projects together. However, in late 2019 a fourth film in the franchise was announced with Lana Wachowski returning to Direct but this time without her sister. This film saw its World Premier showcasing in Toronto, Canada on 16th of this month and was released in Russia on the same day, before its worldwide release this week. Early indications are that the film has garnered generally positive Reviews and has so far grossed US$69M from its production budget of US$190M. 

Thomas Anderson (Keanu Reeves) is a successful video game developer and the creator of The Matrix video game trilogy based on faint albeit recurring memories of Neo. At a local coffee shop, Anderson comes into contact with Tiffany (Carrie-Anne Moss), married to Chad (Chad Stahelski) and with two young boys but with no recollection of her past, on which Anderson based Trinity, a character in his game. Anderson struggles at times to differentiate between what he perceives as his reality from his dreams. His therapist (Neil Patrick Harris) prescribes him blue pills to suppress such occurrences, which one day he just stops taking.

Anderson operates a programme simulation called a modal, a testing environment, created to develop game characters. A girl named Bugs (Jessica Henwick) learns that the modal is running old code in a loop, that shows when Trinity first found Neo within the original Matrix. Bugs discovers a programme manifesting Morpheus (Yahya Abdul-Mateen II), and helps free him before Anderson's business partner, Smith (Jonathan Groff), can erase the modal. After discovering his location, Bugs and Morpheus extract Anderson from the Matrix and learn that Smith is actually Agent Smith (as portrayed by Hugo Weaving in the first three films).

Neo wakes up in a pod covered in a gel like substance and with wires and probes protruding from his arms, chest, back, neck and mouth. He observes Trinity confined in another one nearby, as machines dispatched by Bugs to retrieve and transport him to Bugs' ship, and into the human stronghold, Io. There, he meets Niobe (Jada Pinkett Smith), who tells him that sixty years have passed in the real world since the Machine War, and that human survivors have joined forces with machines that defected to join human society. Though Neo is adamant he wants to rescue Trinity, Niobe opposes and orders Neo to stay out of the Matrix and imprisons him. Bugs and her crew disobey the order and bust Neo out of his cell in order that he can free Trinity.

Neo, Bugs and the crew enter the Matrix, where they are confronted by Smith and other exile programs including The Merovingian (Lambert Wilson) who want the Matrix restored to its earlier format. A fight breaks out in an abandoned warehouse, and Neo battles Smith, ultimately gaining the upper hand as he steadily regains his hand to hand combat capabilities. They leave and locate Tiffany working in her motorcycle workshop, but just as Neo begins talking to her, his therapist appears and immobilises Neo by manipulating time to slow motion. He reveals his identity as the Analyst, a programme designed to study the human mind. He explains that after Neo and Trinity died, he was able to resurrect the pair to study them, by rebuilding their bodies, which explains why they have only aged twenty years in the last sixty. In doing so, he found that suppressing their memories but keeping them close produced an efficient, power-producing Matrix, resistant to the anomalies that resulted in the previous versions failing. Neo's release has destabilised the system and threatened a reboot of the Matrix, according to the Analyst, who has bought time from his superiors, whom he convinced that Neo would voluntarily return to his pod to avoid putting Trinity's life at risk.

Neo and Bugs forcibly exit the Matrix when another ship sent by Niobe brings their ship back to Io. Niobe takes Neo to Sati (Priyanka Chopra Jonas), an exile programme he previously met, whose parents were killed by the machines. Looking to avenge their death, Sati helps concoct a plan to free Trinity. Back in the Matrix at the cafe where Neo and Tiffany first met, Neo offers a deal with the Analyst that if he fails to convince Trinity to remember her past and voluntarily leave the Matrix, he would agree to return to his pod. The Analyst accepts. As Neo tries to convince Tiffany she's part of the Matrix, her family appears tempting her to stay. She initially gives in but before she has exited the cafe she rejects their pleas recalling her true identity as Trinity. As the Analyst attempts to kill her, Smith appears seeking revenge for his own imprisonment, which gives Neo, Trinity, and the others the chance to escape. What follows is a high octane chase through the streets with a swarm of sentient computer beings hot on the tail of Trinity and Neo riding on the back of a motorcycle as sentient bodies are shot, crushed, run over, mowed down and obliterated and cars explode all around them. 

Being the last waiting to be extracted, Neo and Trinity become stranded on the roof top of a skyscraper as heavily armed helicopters shoot off countless rounds of machine gun fire at them. Holding hands, they leap off the roof top hoping Neo is able to harness his ability to fly, but instead Trinity gains the ability, and flies them to safety. With their recently discovered control over the Matrix, both return to meet the Analyst, who now has taken on a submissive stance. They jokingly thank him for the opportunity of a fresh start, which they intend to use to remodel the Matrix as they deem most appropriate. The Analyst looks down but not out, as Neo and Trinity fly off into the sunset.  

'The Matrix Resurrections' is essentially a love story wrapped up in computer code with fast paced action, stunning visuals, and plenty of nods to the original trilogy using actual footage lifted straight from those first three films to remind or educate the viewer of what came before and how we got to this point. The film will no doubt please fans of those first three instalments, and it is easily the best since 1999's 'The Matrix' first hit cinema's screens with its bullet-time, red pill/blue pill, wire-fu fight sequences that defined an era of action Sci-Fi movies. The strong cast here also are a return to form for Reeves and Moss who especially have chemistry that is clearly evident in every scene they share together. At a running time of two and a half hours the film moves a long at a swift pace and never leaves you wanting, and the ending certainly leaves room for a follow-on movie, so whether this is defined as a sequel and the end of the franchise, or a reboot and the start of something new, remains to be seen. See it on the big screen - you won't be disappointed.

'The Matrix Resurrections' merits four claps of the Odeon Online clapperboard from a possible five claps.

-Steve, at Odeon Online-