DON'T BREATHE : Tuesday 6th September 2016.

I saw 'DON'T BREATHE' at my local Multiplex in the week having read much good press about this supposed original horror film. And, I say supposed, because for me this is not a horror film in the traditional sense where we expect shock value, blood and gore, random acts of violence and things that go bump in the night. Directed by Fede Alvarez who brought us 'The Evil Dead' reboot in 2013 here he brings us this suspenseful home invasion psychological thriller film that has received positive reviews since its release and has made US$67M off its US$10M budget outlay. The film is Co-Produced by horror maestro Sam Raimi.

Here the film opens with three Detroit living thieves Rocky (Jane Levy), Alex (Dylan Minnette) and Money (Daniel Zovatto) breaking, entering and stealing from the homes that are supposedly safely secured by Alex's father's security company. Rocky and Alex go about stealing valuables that can be resold, while Money gets his kicks from vandalising and trashing the houses they gain forced entry into, and keeping a watchful eye out. Their fence gives them well below market value for the goods that Money brings to them, but it is enough for Rocky and her little sister to escape their no hope parents for a life in California by the beach. One day in a meeting with the fence, when Rocky is sounding off about how the risk is all theirs for little reward, he is alerted to an Army Veteran living in a largely abandoned neighbourhood that has recently come into some money - about US$300K from a settlement following the death of his daughter in a car accident, and all that money is in the house, in cash! Later that day Money stakes out the house in a derelict and abandoned suburb of Detroit, and further learns that the man in question is in fact blind.

The three agree that with this kind of pay day, and a blind man holed up in a house alone in an abandoned neighbourhood, that this would be easy pickings that could see them all get outta Dodge once and for all. They agree to go in under cover of darkness at 2:00am in the morning when the blind man is asleep. They drug the guard dog - a Rottweiler, and gain entry by breaking through a first floor bathroom window activating a delayed alarm which Alex is able to disarm using a controller stolen from his father. The threesome scour the house searching for the location of the cash, while the blind man sleeps upstairs, but are unable to find it.

They come across a heavily padlocked door, and despite his best efforts with a crow bar, Money is unable to gain entry. He produces a gun to shoot through the reinforced padlock, but Alex is angry that carrying a weapon exposes them to greater criminal charges if arrested, and motions to leave via the rear kitchen door. Money ignores him, shoots the padlock, which awakens the blind man who stumbles down the stairs as if frightened and weak. A tussle breaks out between the two, but not before Money has stated that he is alone in the house and threatens the blind man if he comes close. Underestimating the strength and fortitude of the blind man, Money is overcome and is shot in the head by his own gun. Rocky looks on in silence from a few paces away and by now Alex has returned to see the dead corpse of Money lying on the floor.

The blind man begins to clean up the mess believing he is now alone in the house, whilst Rocky makes a quick retreat in silence into a closet, and Alex darts into the bathroom from where they gained entry. Hiding in a corner, the blind man enters with a sheet of board, hammer and nails and covers up the broken window making the house secure again. He checks all exists and padlocks every door. Rocky and Alex are now locked in. The blind man, walks into the closet where Rocky is in hiding. He removes a secret panel revealing a safe with a digital combination. He opens it revealing a stash of cash that looks a lot more than US$300K. She witnesses the four digit security code as the safe is locked and the blind man disappears to continue his clean up. Alex locates Rocky and then opens the safe, takes the money and stashes it in her back pack.

Meanwhile, with his heightened sense of smell and hearing, the blind man comes across the shoes left in the kitchen by the three burglars so as to make less noise while going about their thieving. He surmises from this that the dead man was not alone, and as such there must be others still in the house. The two evade the blind man by finding a door leading to the cellar under the house. The cellar is a labyrinth of shelves with access corridors between, and anterooms but upon entering the house they notice a storm door which was bolted from the inside. While searching for the storm door they come across a bound and gagged woman in a makeshift padded cell, who they soon realise is the woman who killed the blind mans daughter.

Her name is Cindy and she shows Rocky and Alex a newspaper clipping proclaiming her innocence. She motions to another safe in which are the keys to her restraints. Racing against time, Rocky and Alex set Cindy free. Reaching the storm door Alex opens the lock from the inside only to be greeted by the blind man waiting for them on the outside, looking down and armed. He shoots at Rocky and Alex using the gun retrieved from Money, but accidentally kills Cindy. He is enraged and plunges the cellar into darkness as the three now scrabble around in the dark with the blind man clearly having the upper hand given that he lives in a perpetual state of darkness.

Rocky and Alex manage to escape back upstairs, but find all their exit points blocked and the dog waiting for them. Rocky tries to escape through the house ventilation system, but Alex is pursued by the dog and falls through a window onto the kitchen skylight below. By now the blind man has re-emerged and seeing Alex semi-conscious on the skylight shoots at it missing Alex but shattering the glass so that he falls through. He drags Alex into a utility room where they fight, with the blind man gaining the upper hand and stabbing at Alex with a pair of heavy gardening shears. He impales the dead body of Money believing it to be Alex. The dog in the meantime has turned its attention to Rocky and is in hot pursuit through the house ventilation ducting, but does not escape the clutches of the blind man, who captures her and beats her unconscious.

The girl comes around tied and restrained in the basement where Cindy was held captive previously with the blind man looking on. He tells Rocky that Cindy was carrying his unborn child, and having taken away his daughter it was now up to her to bear him a new one. Now he blames Rocky for Cindy's death, and therefore having taken his unborn child away it was now beholden on Rocky to bear him a child. He tells Rocky that Cindy was a willing participant in her pregnancy on the condition that he let her go upon the birth - a promise he had every intention of keeping, and will do so when Rocky bears him a child. But, as he's not a rapist he intends to artificially inseminate her using a turkey baster and his frozen sperm, which he is defrosting whilst telling her this. Just before the crucial moment, Alex bursts onto the scene and in another scuffle manages to secure the blind man with a pair of handcuffs used to restrain Cindy and Rocky, and free Rocky in the process. They escape back upstairs, but before you know it the blind man has freed himself and emerges at the cellar door with gun, takes aim, shoots and kills Alex.

Rocky makes off and escapes outside pursued by the dog, and finding the parked car a couple of blocks away seeks refuge therein, but no keys. After evading the dog successfully, she gets out of the confines of the now useless car only to be knocked out again by the blind man from behind. She is dragged by the hair down the empty street in broad daylight and dumped on the floor back in the house next to the dead body of Alex. Using the remote intruder alarm controller which she finds close to Alex's body she activates the loud alarm system which disorientates the blind man for long enough for the girl to beat him with a crow bar and send him backwards down into the cellar discharging the gun he is holding into his own stomach. She retrieves her back pack carrying the stash of cash and makes off into the sunlight just as a Police car rounds the corner and up the deserted street.

I enjoyed 'Don't Breathe' and thought that it is up there with that other sleeper hit of the same genre 'The Green Room' from earlier in the year. The story is simple enough, original, well delivered, with a couple of jump scares, a good dose of suspense, an antagonist who just won't back down when his home is invaded by three opportunistic kids and who harbours a dark secret, and, a protagonist who survives against the odds in a deadly game of cat and mouse within the confines of a humble, albeit well secured dwelling. Certainly worth the price of your ticket.

 

-Steve, at Odeon Online-