effective scares nonsensical ideas work against it

Rating: 6/10 (4 April 2018)

Essentially this is an excuse for a bunch of SHOCKINGLY LOUD sound effects. Which will make you jump. On the whole Krasinski shows himself to be a better director than writer, and or the multiple writers added enough elements that the follow through doesn't work out.
As I left the theatre I could already hear people complaining about things that didn't make sense in the film.
It does involve you in the family's plight, but a key main plot point doesn't really make sense and keeps not making sense as it creates various suspense scenes.
There are both questions that aren't answered and answers that don't make sense and raise more questions that are better left not asked. Once you are done being shocked by some enormous noise and mostly effective set pieces--sort of like those in Jurassic Park, you keep getting distracted by the nonsense.
Technically and from a craftsmanship point of view the movie is slick in a good sense with the needed good sound design and with a better than average Beltrami music score that helps the scares and connects the family love elements.
Creatures are all CG but for the most part well done, they get a little less interesting the more we see of them and for creatures that have sensitive hearing they make an awful lot of noise, an awful lot--just one of the movies logic problems. By the end SPAWN fans will wonder what he's doing running around in this film.
You could say this movie has that Hollywood weakness of wanted an effect more than a reason for those effects. And in this case there is drama and melodrama the film is wanting to create and does.
There is very little dialogue in the film though a bit too much subtitling--as they family uses sign language to communicate, the few real dialogue scenes are ok with one poor exception being a phony father son talk with the kid talks like 70 year old worldly woman.
You'll be on the edge of your seat until you aren't and then it all starts to fall apart, too bad.
Let me put it to you this way what's the first thing you'd do with your wife in a world where silence is key to survival?
Yeah, well, you're answer won't be what these parents do. Never.