I was disappointed I couldn’t see Knock at the Cabin in theatres, but then, remember how Old looked great and then sucked harder than a vacuum with a lollipop? M. Night Shyamalan has got to be the most sporadic of all our current directors, praisable for providing original concepts and gusto, but you flip a coin with each movie to figure out if the production will lead to a worthwhile execution.
Leonard (Dave Bautista) is very good at collecting grasshoppers. He shows a young Wen (Kristen Cui), when he meets her outside her family’s secluded holiday cabin. Eventually, Leonard tells Wen that he and a few other people are going to need to talk to her daddies, and it would be wise if Wen could convince her parents to let them in. Understandably spooked, Wen runs inside to warn Eric (Jonathan Groff) and Andrew (Ben Aldridge), who lock down their fortress before there is a promised knock at the cabin…………It turns out, Leonard and his three-person crew are on the same mission as Idris Elba in Pacific Rim, because they’re here to CANCEL THE APOCALYPSE!! Eric, Andrew, and Wen must chose to sacrifice one of themselves to prevent the upcoming end of days. The intruders – Leonard, Sabrina (Nikki Amuka-Bird), Adriana (Abby Quinn), and Redman (Rupert Grint) – have been brought together, experiencing horrific visions that have led them to this cabin, unbeknownst to them who would be inside.
I think it’s fair to say that sometimes Shyamalan can run into the problem of creating one-dimensional and wooden characters, and there’s remnants of that here. Sabrina can only talk about being a nurse, and Adriana bangs on about being a server – Rupert Grint’s Redman gives a wonky introduction before an unsatisfactorily quick exit. These details are integral to the overall story, but they don’t have to be the only things these characters can say. Alonso Duralde, of Breakfast All Day and The Wrap, criticised Jordan Peele’s Us by saying it’s a movie that either tells us too much or explains not enough, and I betcha he said the same thing here. Because there is a version of this story that could be purely from the family’s point of view, where the intruder’s motives are deliberately vague. But I think the movie wants to have these intruders be familiar, and by the character’s own admission, they want to be transparent with the family, as they understand how incredulous and terrible their claims appear to be, but they never really get there. Watching this movie, I know there were moments where all I felt was ‘why, why, why?’. A good mystery movie is aware of the questions, balances the answers; withholds the answers it wants to save for later, but gives the answers it needs to keep the mystery viable. Why is the apocalypse happening now? Has this decision been made before? What exactly are these visions? Aren’t these intruders, by their own logic, causing these apocalyptic events they’re here to prevent, when they kill each other? How does that sit with them? Even if there’s no clean answers to these questions, our protagonists still could’ve asked them.
I thought there was an opportunity for our home invaders to be shown to be equally mortified and relieved at hearing the first news bulletin; seemingly, for the first time, their mission is affirmed to be true. It’s one small suggestion, but a beat that could’ve added so much more humanity to the trio. Still, even through what we got, Dave Bautista is undeniably cool in this role – I think I remember he played a wound-up nerd at the beginning of Blade Runner 2049 as well, and wowed everyone with how measured he was. For this huge muscley dude to ever be convincing as meek probably dents my assumptions of the world more than anything else, but I also think Bautista is a really valuable actor, and a worthy contributor. Of our protagonists, Wen is so sweet, but I was disappointed her perspective diminishes as the movie goes on. I didn’t recognise either actor playing her daddies, but I gravitated towards Ben Aldridge the most.
Positively, the flashbacks, reminiscent of those in Split, definitely help inform Eric and Andrew’s character and relationship, which are essential if we are to feel their love, the reason they have been forsaken. The choice to have this couple be gay also adds colour and intrigue to the caper, because it allows for more visceral substance behind the pair’s initial question; “is this a calculated attack?” And even when it’s not, it’s still egregious that this ‘Modern Family’ has been singled out. I had many complaints about how Old was shot, but Knock at the Cabin is much more digestible, and most memorable are the disturbingly extreme close-ups of Leonard and Wen while they’re chewing the fat outside at the beginning. I even got shivers when Lenard is reciting the news bulletin at the exact time the TV presenter is saying it 😮 And they’re exactly the chilling moments you hope to have when you’re watching a Shyamalan suspense!
I don’t know what Eric saw in the glimmering light, if anything – sure would like to go back and find out. (And because I rented this movie for 24 hours, I could 😊 This movie sure would demand a rewatch if you saw it in cinemas just to investigate that half a second… For the record, I saw nothing). The sheer mention of it made me think of Ari Aster, and that memorable moment in Midsommar, when Florence Pugh’s character sees a figure in the bathroom mirror – a technique that is, namely, filming important information, or a potential jump scare, outside the primary focal point of vision. Shyamalan has been a suspense director for a long time, lauded these days for his twist endings of the nineties, and that first alien appearance in Signs, and I wonder how much inspiration he’s tempted to emulate by the growing next generation topping the world today. I wonder if this was one such example.
I also noticed in the opening titles, additional screenplay credits – Steve Desmond and Michael Sherman – and I wonder if these guys served as guard rails that may’ve helped Shyamalan shape the story, and stay on course. Because Knock of the Cabin is decidedly more entertaining than some of Shyamalan’s works that have come before – it provides fun schlocky B-grade horror in the moment of consumption, even if I spend the next few days still scratching my head. A low 3.0.
3.0
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