We pick up with John "Big Tuna" Krasinski and his family as they are in the midst of surviving an apocalyptic invasion of auditorily adept creatures of unexplained origin that viciously attack and devour anything that makes even the slightest sound. We first seem 'em in action when their youngest son is pounced on after activating his battery-powered toy rocket ship which he was forbidden to have. About a year later, the family is living practically in total silence out on a farm. The eldest daughter - who is deaf, coincidentally - feels guilty over her brother's death and feels her father blames her for it and the mother has another child on the way. After going into labor, things go from bad to worse when the creatures swarm their dwelling and the fight for survival becomes paramount.
First off, as far as theatrical viewing, this is NOT a popcorn movie. It's more of an egg salad movie. I've never seen so many people afraid to eat their concessions at a film showing. Reason of course being, the majority of this movie is VERY quiet, if not completely soundless, which is actually pretty fucking cool, I thought. This both does a good job of bringing you into the head of a deaf character as well as boosting the tension in key scenes where the characters mustn't make a peep - making you feel all the more involved in what's going on. This also increases the impact of jump-scares, which weren't all that prevalent, yet the ones it had worked well. I didn't much like the look of the creatures. It just seemed like too familiar of a design, as did the films premise in not going anywhere all that unpredictable. That said, I had a good time checking this out at my local cineplex. It's definitely a rare kind of experience, seeing as how so much of the movie is so quiet and played out using mostly sign language in place of dialog. Good atmosphere, decent performances and quick enough pace. Just wish the creatures and plot structure were a little more original.
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