Wasted premise, waste of time

Rating: 1/10 (15 October 2013)

Wow, just wow. I "wow" at how such a premise can be wasted on such a lame cliché ridden so called "horror" film. The Purge lit the internet and box office a storm upon initial release thanks the clever and original marketing campaign for a very interesting concept. What would happen if crime were legal once a year for a few hours? It's a grand idea for a movie one ripe for ideas, so sad then that the filmmakers settled for such a bad one and for such a generic production.
The story centring almost entirely inside the house of the Sandin family begs the question of why the purge even is a part of the film? The movie in the end could just be any standard home invasion thriller/horror, just utterly wasting the whole idea of what a night in The Purge would be like. It's made all the worse by small ideas and scenes offer up an insight into the possibilities of a well done Purge movie. The friendly neighbours turning, the angry boyfriend taking matters into his own hands there are countless opportunities here that play second fiddle to a lame and frankly unbelievable story.
Another major problem with The Purge is the horrible main set of characters, Hawke tries his best but it must be said doesn't do much while the other bunch of headliners in Heady who is wasted and Wakefield who thinks smiling every 3 seconds is creepy (by the way it's not) barely makes a dint in the film where he should own it with his menacing evil doer. In regards to the child actors Max Burkholder and Adelaide Kane the less said the better.
The Purge is simply a bad, seen a million times before home invasion movie. What makes it particularly annoying and also like a slap in the face is how it squanders its idea. On the success financially of the movie a sequel has been green lit; can someone please do something with the idea? One can only hope because it wouldn't take much to make this a truly scary and believable horror.
Half a remote control car out of 5 For more movie reviews and opinions check out - www.jordanandeddie.wordpress.com