An above average horror film

Rating: 8/10 (16 September 2016)

A 7.6 rating on IMDb is incredibly high for a horror film. So when I saw 'Dont Breathe' contained such a rating before going to see it, I suspected I was in for something pretty special. Director Fede Alvarez' one previous film, the 2013 remake of 'Evil Dead', was a very fine film. It was intense, scary and brutal. A new director stamping his mark on the genre from the outset. Could he live up to it a second time though? I think you'd have to say he did. This time he takes on an original story (a breathe of fresh air in the horror genre) that he has written himself. It's an intriguing premise. A blind man being robbed, who is more capable than first perceived and chooses to fight back. Then add in some extra twists and turns along the way and you have yourself a lot of potential. But we know that in this beloved genre of ours potential doesn't always equal results.
Luckily Alvarez clearly has the filmmaking talents to pull it off. It's a very different type of story to 'Evil Dead' and yet still captures the same levels of intensity and brutality. One thing I didn't like was the opening scene showing a man dragging a character down the road. I love opening scenes that give a sneak preview into something that will occur later in the film when they are done right, but this simply wasn't. That type of a snippet should give the audience a "Huh?" feeling or a "How the hell are they going to make sense of that?" thought. This one achieved neither of those. Other than that though there really isn't a lot to criticise here. The acting is good, the directing is good and the whole experience is pretty damn enjoyable. 7.6 to me implies it should be one of the best horror movies ever made. To me it certainly didn't live up to that kind of level, but make no mistake, Alvarez is a director to take note of in the future.