Knock At The Cabin Review
This taut thriller eschews a lot of the more violent tropes in favor of its intriguing premise, but wraps everything in a religious gauze that feels odd and, at times, contrived.
Eric (Jonathan Groff) and Andrew (Ben Aldridge) are holidaying with their adopted daughter Wen (Kristen Cui) in a remote cabin in the woods, without phone reception. Their idyllic stay is interrupted by four visitors - Leonard (Dave Bautista), Sabrina (Nikki Amuka-Bird), Redmond (Ruper Grint) and Ardiane (Abby Quinn). These visitors tie the family up, and tell them that they are harbingers of the apocalypse. They give them a choice - they can either willingly choose to kill one of their own family here in this cabin, or the entire world will be destroyed and everyone in it, with the trio left to wander the earth alone for the rest of their life.
M. Night Shamylan directs this taut thriller, which to its credit is both self-container and tightly wound. There’s little extraneous here, which makes it feel fast-paced and deserving. He also has a lot of fun playing with the claustrophobic elements of this cabin; the space feels small, and this is aided by the constant tightly framed close ups of the actors. We really feel how tight the space is; the danger of proximity, despite the woodland setting.
Groff and Aldridge are spectacular in their respective roles; the comfortable, calm and quietly spiritual Eric next to the angry, scared Andrew. Bautista is also remarkable in the film, calm and imposing throughout. The remainder of the four horsemen here make less of an impact - Grint’s appearance is mercifully brief, unexplainable-accent-forward, and impactless, Quinn is overly and oft-times annoyingly grating, and Amuka-Bird similarly OTT.
The real star, however, is Kristen Cui as the young Wen. Wen’s incredulous performance is the perfect foil to the events unfolding on screen. She is a fantastic barometer for the audience; recognising that what we are seeing is ridiculous, but buying into it at the same time.
Ultimately, these films rely heavily on the plot, and while this one is interesting and certainly more successful than something like Old, it also feels overtly religious and a little disappointing. The plane scenes are fantastic, but the rest of the world ending horror is a little bit meh. The conclusion, when it comes, fires like a damp squib more than a culminating punch.
That being said, Knock At The Cabin is a perfectly fine thriller, with enough scares, an engaging enough story, and a suite of enjoyable performances, to make it worth your time in the theater.
