Don't Breathe – movie review

This tense, claustrophobic thriller cleverly inverts the premise behind such thrillers as Wait Until Dark and Blind Terror, in which a vulnerable blind woman was terrorised by killers until she fought back. Here though it is a blind person who is doing the terrorising. And it is a surprisingly effective thriller that grips until the very end.

Detroit is an economically depressed city, and there are lots of empty houses in once flourishing suburbs that now resemble ghettos. Rocky (Jane Levy), Money (Daniel Zovatto) and Alex (Dylan Minnette, from the recent Goosebumps) break into the houses of wealthy owners and, like a version of The Bling Ring, help themselves to goods and electronics. Alex uses inside information as his father works for a security company and he is able to learn the codes of the alarm systems. Rocky wants to leave her trailer park home in Detroit and her abusive mother and head off to California to start a better life. Money though is the more crude of the three and urinates on the furniture and breaks valuable objects.

The three decide to break into a house which is the home to a reclusive blind man who is rumoured to have a fortune stashed away inside his house. He also lives alone since his daughter was killed in a car accident. Alex is initially reluctant because he thinks this is morally wrong, but eventually tags along because he has an unrequited crush on Rocky.

But the three get more than they bargained for with their last big heist. The blind man (played by Avatar‘s villain Stephen Lang) is a former vet who served in Iraq, and he has a particular skill set that enables him to deal with the intruders. He also has a secret in the house that he is anxious to protect. What began as a simple intrusion soon turns into a battle for survival, as the blind man stalks them through his heavily fortified house. He is as proficient and as deadly as Rutger Hauer in Blind Fury.

Director Fede Alvarez was born in Uruguay, but raised on a diet of horror and suspense films, and he has a great understanding of the tropes of the exploitation genre. After a few films in his native country he tackled mainstream Hollywood fare with a remake of Sam Raimi’s Evil Dead that was both proficient, unrelenting and quite violent. Here Alvarez efficiently ramps up the suspense and makes good use of the confined setting. There are plenty of unexpected twists and bizarre turns, and even a nifty piece of misdirection in this cat and mouse pursuit through a house of horrors. Alvarez makes good use of a small budget to create one of the better suspense thrillers of the year, one that will nail audiences to their seats for the duration of the brisk 88 minutes running time.

Cinematographer Pedro Luque creates a palpable sense of dread. Alvarez also uses inventive sound design and lighting effects to heighten the suspense and growing sense of dread. There is also a nasty edge to the violence here that is unusual for mainstream Hollywood fare.

Lang stands out as the villain and he has an imposing and formidable presence. But his angry blind vet intent on killing the intruders is also more than a one-dimensional villain. Levy, who starred in Alvarez’s remake of Evil Dead, makes for a feisty heroine in the mould of Jodie Foster’s character in Panic Room.

Director: Fede Alvarez
Cast: Jane Levy, Stephen Lang, Dylan Minnette, Jane May Graves
Release Date: 1 September 2016
Rating: MA 15+

Greg King