It Comes at Night (2017)

Trailer:

*Spoilers Throughout*

What’s This About: A family sticks (pun intended) it out in a home in the woods after a terrible pandemic ravages the country. Their safety is on the line when they are confronted with another surviving family. 

Here are some of my observations as I watched the film:

• Oh boy are the COVID-19 similarities going to be tough to avoid when your movie starts with a daughter saying goodbye to her dying dad while she’s wearing a gas mask. 
• Two people wheel the dead man into the woods and smother his face with a pillow and shoot him in the face. And then they douse him in gasoline and set him ablaze. Have we reached that stage in our pandemic yet? Asking for a president. 
• Did they Instacart that food?
• Joel Edgerton plays Paul and he and his son, Travis, were the ones who mercy killed Paul’s wife’s dad. Sarah, the wife, thinks that having her son partake in the ordeal was a mistake. Paul flatly states that he couldn’t do it alone. Well did you try Paul? Did you?
• I wonder how many pervs rented this flick thinking it was a overtly obvious porn title?

• Travis’ bedroom has a poster of a very famous painting of hell or Armageddon hanging on the wall. Did he always have that up or only since this world went to shit? Seems like an odd choice of decor before the actual Armageddon. 
• I knew that Jump scare was coming but damn it still got me. Kudos. 
• This film’s use of limited light or only flashlight is very effective I must say. That reminds me that I should stock up on survival supplies very soon.
• Paul and family have an intruder. He’s wearing a mask over his nose and mouth. Man this is hitting too close to home. And this flick was made in 2017! How is no one mentioning this movie these days!?
• I know they’re living in tough times but their house really wasn’t fortified well. The intruder fella only had to break like one lock. 
• And they have no floodlights for outside? What kind of survivalists are they?
• Do they even have enough toilet paper?
• They tie the intruder to a tree and cover his face with a bag. I guess he’s just going to die alone out there? Just like Herman Cain. 
• Not exactly southern hospitality is it?

• Paul is interrogating the intruder and the fella tells him that the only thing he knows for sure is everyone in the city was getting sick and was fleeing the city. Damn the current event similarities are eerie. 
• He also says that he thought Paul’s house was abandoned and that’s why he broke in. The fella could’ve knocked or shouted first. 
• Sarah inquires that the intruder may have found their location from her dad’s funeral pyre. She could be right. They better kill their infected in better ways. Like putting them in a nursing home in New Jersey. 
• I realize all my jokes are waaaaay too soon. Forgive me but I don’t care.
• Paul gives the intruder, Will, a ride back to his family about 10 miles away. I’m sure nothing bad will happen to them as they drive there. Call it a hunch. 
• See? They’re fine. Just some stray bullets from out of those bushes. 
• Paul and Will manage to kill the two MAGA, I mean Proud Boys or whoever. Maybe they were in the Wolverine Watchmen. 
• Cut back to the house and Paul is back with Will and his wife and son. All seems fine. Paul is explaining all the house rules and protocols. I should take better notes because this could be us in a few months. 
• Long montage of chopping wood, foraging in the woods, showing the new folks how to get fresh water and where the chickens are for eggs. They all seem to be getting very along. I’m sure they all live happily ever after and don’t get paranoid with each other at all. AT ALL!

• Can you imagine if life gets this bad and we have to help out people who kicked and screamed to dine out at Applebee’s and yelled at grocery store clerks for refusing to wear masks? When the shit really hits the fan I’m not helping out a soul and I’m especially not allowing them in my house.
• Is this a dream? Will’s wife came into Travis’ room kissed him and bled into his mouth and then they fuck. Travis has had like 2–3 dreams already so I’m not sure if this is one.
• Yeah it must have been a dream because he’s now talking to her in the kitchen talking about not being able to sleep. Bitch, I haven’t had a decent nights sleep since 11/09/2016. 
• Travis admits that he doesn’t like cookies, bread pudding, cupcakes or ice cream. What a weirdo. 
• More wood chopping? I get that they live with no electricity or running water but you could show them doing something else in the survivalist mode. Like go on a liquor store run in a red state with blue laws on a Sunday.
• At this point, I would bring up the idea of wife-swapping. C’mon it’s the apocalypse! Live a little!

• Travis’ dog runs off into the woods and disappears. Now they think they heard something beyond the hill. Maybe it’s Antifa. Sneaky bastards.
• This movie is dragging now. Nothing of note has happened for the past 15–20 minutes.
• You know what else comes at night? Mr. Sandman to quickly take me to slumber land quickly away from this slog.
• The dog is back and it’s near death. Paul assumes it’s infected. If only if they didn’t throw away Obama’s pandemic playbook none of this would’ve happened. 
• I had this horrible dreadful thought that the “It” of this movie is the same “It” from It Follows. 
• Travis just let it be known that the front door was already opened when he found the dog. So now they’re extra paranoid and bickering about what could’ve happened. 
• Alright enough of the nightmares. It’s getting old. Travis has a nightmare every night. Take an ambien or something!
• Travis overhears what he assumes is the little boy, Andrew, might be sick and he alerts his folks. Now they’re on full paranoid mode. 
• Paul tries to get Will to open the door but is ambushed and disarmed by Will who has guns of his own.
• “Take your mask off. No one’s sick here. Take your fucking mask off!” I swear I just heard this at my local supermarket a few days ago. 
• Will tells Paul that they want to leave but just need ample supply of food and water. It’s getting harder to believe that your kid isn’t sick Will.
• If only they had Regeneron! They would be cured and immune!

• Sarah is essentially useless in this flick. 
• While Will and Sarah both attempt to both lower their weapons, the unthinkable happens and Paul ambushes Will and takes control. 
• Is there going to be some neat M. Night Shyamalan twist in this flick? There’s only 11 minutes left. Maybe Will has superpowers or aliens come out of cave and cure them all.
• Paul is wheeling out Will, who’s tied up, while Sarah has Will’s wife and child marching at gunpoint. Will overtakes Paul and almost beats the life out of him with a rock. Not sure what Sarah is doing other than watching and saying “stop it.” Finally she must’ve remembered that she had a rifle and shoots Will in the back. Meanwhile Will’s wife runs into the woods holding Andrew and Paul fires at them and kills Andrew. 
• After she screams at Paul for “killing her baby,” Paul then shoots her dead. He may have had second thoughts but probably not.
• The next time Travis wakes up his mom is telling him that he’s going to be OK but he has multiple lesions on his face. 
• Meanwhile Paul is sobbing alone. 
• Next shot we have Paul and Sarah at their table in the kitchen alone without Travis. I’m guessing he’s dead. And that they’re infected too. 
• I guess the moral of the story is never let anyone into your life. And wear a damn mask!

 

Was it Entertaining: 

Any Good Gore: This wasn’t that type of flick. Had a few of diseased people and a ton of sad faces.

Any Nudity: Zilch

Best Quote: Not really a quotable movie really. But here’s something: “You can’t trust anyone but family.”

Best Scene: Sometimes the tension was used effectively as was the use of pale and dim lighting. The best scene was probably when the family first encounters Will.

Worst Scene: The finale was made to be ambiguous with who is infected and if they truly are infected and then the fighting and deaths. Maybe it was because I was sleepy but I didn’t really pick up on Travis being sick until he was obviously sick. Not exactly a terrible scene but this movie was so dull and trying to be cerebral that nothing was great or bad.

How Pandemicky Was It?: It didn’t touch much on the hows and whys of the actual disease or virus going around and the background of it and how long they’ve been quarantining themselves was not much discussed. Or maybe it was and it’s possible I forgot. But the fear of infection and trying to keep isolated and survive alone is the key theme to this. 

Final Thoughts: While not a terrible movie, it wasn’t entertaining or frightening either. Going in, I only heard mixed reviews and that’s very justifiable as it just didn’t deliver what I wanted in this paranoia pandemic flick. However, due to the fact that we are dealing with a huge pandemic now in 2020, this movie did provide some needed commentary on trust and survival. And maybe that’s an extreme thought as we’re not quite in full armageddon mode but the jokes I made fit too perfectly with what this movie portrayed. If I had watched this in 2017 I probably would’ve hated it but I’m shocked that more people aren’t discussing and dissecting this movie more these days. I haven’t seen one meme or fake video to tie in with the COVID-19 pandemic.

Score: 3 Months Left of the Trump Presidency (Fingers-Crossed)(out of ten)