Nailed it

Rating: 10/10 (10 April 2018)

In December 2017, AMC theatres throughout the United States posted a notice outside screenings of Star Wars: The Last Jedi, cautioning audiences that the film contained a 10 second segment with absolutely no sound, and that this was a deliberate artistic choice, rather than a technical error (sigh). It's easy to imagine John Krasinski nearly having a heart attack (or perhaps gleefully chuckling) in the final stages of editing A Quiet Place, imagining the bedlam he was about to unleash on mass audiences that terrified of the sound of silence. A cinematic Occam's razor at its finest, A Quiet Place is an unassuming genre masterpiece: an ingeniously simple conceit whittled down to its core essentials (think High Noon, but with less talking and more ravenous monsters with dangerously good hearing). It's told with such care, compassion, and furious gusto that, as I write this, an hour and a half after watching, my entire body still aches from 90s minutes of perennially tensing up in captivated terror.
Frights and fun aside, Krasinski's work is actually a thing of beauty, by the sheer act of shackling his audience down and forcing them to really listen. His film's sound editing is fiendishly simple, but damned if you don't tear shreds out of your theatre armrests with each crinkle of a falling leaf, or the faintest creak of a swaying door. Watching the film live in a theatre is a precarious experience, all too easily ruined by an audience unwilling to buy into the covenant of shared cinematic silence, where the slightest rustle or crunch of popcorn (let alone that most egregious of sins: a cell phone) feels almost profane in its intrusion. But, that blissful moment of a room full of people collectively holding their breath to the proverbial pin drop extent each time the film cuts the volume to nil is unforgettably powerful (and, yes, extremely deliberate and artistic). In short: Krasinski has made a film so painfully tense that it feels dangerous to breathe.
No Hollywood contrivances or asininely unmotivated horror here; not a scrap of unnecessary apocalypse exposition or thematic spoon-feeding. Just robust, honest storytelling at its finest, and an incessant sense of genuine, palpable threat throughout, balanced by moments so tenderly human it hurts. In Krasinski's hands (and playfully sadistic sense of foreshadowing), the most innocent child's toy or household item becomes a horrifying set piece unto itself - or an unexpected vessel for hope or peace amidst the omnipresent threat. Charlotte Bruus Christensen's creeping cinematography is exquisitely claustrophobic, lurking through and pillaging each nook and cranny of the inventively average farmhouse setting. Visual effects are used sparingly but effectively, lending just enough unique touches to an otherwise somewhat familiar creature design to make them feel sufficiently fresh and nightmarish. Rounding out the package, Marco Beltrami's musical score is as mercifully sparse as it is brutally chilling in its single drone simplicity.
But the film truly transcends genre not just as a flooring sensory experience, and feature-length jump-scare of the most authentic, least cheap variety. It's also, quite surprisingly, achingly emotional and daringly sweet - a tender, sincere tale of resilience, love, family, and quiet heroism in the face of unthinkable odds. Needless to say, the central foursome of Krasinski, Emily Blunt, Millicent Simmonds, and Noah Jupe perform the hell out of it with universally superb, committed, and unspeakably (ha) loveable work across the board. If there's a single nit to pick, it's that the film leans pretty hard on conventional gender norms - but each character feels too authentic and heartfelt to succumb to stereotypes, with enough surprises and inversions along the way to keep things from reverting to full-on frontier mythology. Krasinski doesn't mess around with his storytelling, and we never once doubt the fact that no one is ever, ever safe. And we care for these nearly wordless people so damn much, that the constant, unwavering threat of losing them is agonizing.
I'd continue to wax poetic about A Quiet Place, but, the sound of my keyboard clattering away in the silence of my apartment is starting to make the hairs on my arms stand up. Just know that, by way of closing note, I'm emphatically crossing my forearms in an 'x' across my chest. Which, as we're oft reminded here, is sign language for 'love.'
-10/10