Review: The Strangers: Prey at Night



RATING:

Directed by Johannes Roberts

Synopsis: A family of 4 travel to a remote trailer park to stay. This is where they encounter the 3 masked killers as the nightmare begins.

The 3 masked killers are back in this more of a standalone that an actual sequel to the 2008 release  The Strangers, directed by Bryan Bertino. Which was effective in building suspense, care for the protagonists and genuinely creepy scenes. While my hopes for this movie weren't exactly high, there was a glimmer of hope in me in that I would be pleasantly surprised. This movie did not deliver for me on any level.



Mike (Martin Henderson) & Cindy (Christina Hendricks)

With a running time of only 1 hour 25 minutes the movie didn't work for me from the very beginning. The introduction of the family immediately I didn't get invested in at all. It was immediately obvious to me that there was no chemistry between these actors at all. The parents Cindy (Christina Hendricks) and Mike (Martin Henderson) weren't believable as parents to their troubled teen Kinsey (Bailee Madison) & son Luke (Lewis Pullman).

Luke (Lewis Pullman)




Kinsey (Bailee Madison)

Besides the obvious chemistry issues between the actors, the recycling of some of the scares the original film did wonderfully just feels forced and was in no way done in any sort of refreshing way. And I swear, if I have to hear the killers' pickup truck rev its engine one more time I'm going to scream.

I found myself not caring about anything this entire movie. The only time the film would get a rise out of me is the bad dialogue, horrible attempts at scaring you and the awful decisions the victims would make. Now I realize that horror movies are known for characters that make bad decisions, but this was just ridiculous and it just felt forced. Almost as if these scenes were written in an attempt to create further tension and scares but it fails miserably.

The killers themselves have no development or intrigue to them at all. With the original release, the killers were mysterious, creepy and had an aura of danger. With this being another installment of these killers, I expected some sort of evolution to them or perhaps just a little more insight into their psychotic way of thinking. I'm all for not explaining too much but with the combination of the poor chemistry between the actors & lack of real originality, the villains just fall flat.

Summary:

The Strangers: Prey at Night is a poorly written & poorly executed movie. It offers nothing new and even fails to deliver on the rehashed scares from the first & far more superior movie. No matter how many times you have seen 2008's The Strangers, watch it again instead of this movie.