Slightly flawed but still highly enjoyable effort

Rating: 9/10 (25 July 2019)

Arriving at their summer home, a family looking to have a relaxing summer vacation are suddenly confronted with mysterious, murderous doppelgangers of themselves who are intent on killing them and anyone else in their way along with their fellow doppelgangers, forcing them to stop the beings.
Overall, this one was enjoyable enough if still somewhat flawed. When this one works, its due to the rather fun concept of this one exploring a really underutilized setup for this one. The nature of the family being tormented by killer versions of themselves created in the fashion that they are here makes for a truly chilling and startling setup that gives this plenty of strong material to work with as the parallel versions of our own dark thoughts. Their penchant for using scissors, dressing in red jumpsuits and being generally creepy looking in their straightforward pursuit of the family is a wholly creepy concept that's incredibly well-detailed here. The connection here to the carnival she visited as a kid and the experiments done beneath the city with the secret tunnels and passageways hiding them as long as they have been is a grand setup here. This provides the film with a lot to like when their entire operation is revealed at the very end down in the lower facility and everything here becomes revealed. As well, this early setup manages to turn out a rather impressive and enjoyable series of action scenes here with the doppelgangers. The initial encounter in the carnival sets this up with a wholly chilling and freaky setup, yet the outstanding home invasion is where this one picks up considerably. With the sheer unknown quality of the family outside standing silently before they move and take over the house, there's an unnerving quality to their movements and behavior which is all the more chilling when compared alongside the stellar confrontations featured with each doppelganger. With the brutality inflicted here and the escape measures they try to employ in order to get away from them, this extended sequence serves the film well with a lot to like and is chilling enough to serve as a launching pad for the rest of the film being out on the run. Later confrontations at their friends' house with those doppelgangers and a series of TV show clips featuring the other doppelgangers out in the community offers the kind of viciousness that makes this one quite fun. That said, there are some issues with this one. The early buildup here with the family, as much fun as they are, stretch the beginning of the film out than it really should causing the film to, in turn, run on longer than it needs to be. These scenes of the father trying to get the family excited about the rustic experience at the cabin or getting together with their friends on the beach which feature some fantastic work setting up the characters but just feel like excess padding that could've gotten to the point sooner. Likewise, the pacing to this one's action scenes are wholly overlong, with the home invasion taking forever to get the intruders inside and then to take over which seems to take far longer than necessary more in terms of pacing and setup than actual on-screen action. Also rather troubling is the finale, where the action is quite underwhelming and it just doesn't end on a high note. These issues end up holding this one down.
Rated R: Graphic Language and Graphic Violence.