M. Night Shyamalan (“The Sixth Sense,” “Split”) is a director who may not deserve the amount of hate he’s gotten, but certainly does deserve some. His films have gone from great to bad to great again to bad again. Yes, the same could be said for virtually any director in the history of film, but Shyamalan almost seems aware of how bad some of his films have been and embraced it. Luckily, his latest movie goes back to the smaller scale and is all the better for it.
“Knock at the Cabin” follows married couple Eric and Andrew, played by Jonathan Groff (“Mindhunter,” “The Matrix Resurrections”) and Ben Aldridge (“Pennyworth,” “Spoiler Alert”) respectively, as they travel with their daughter Wen, played by Kristen Cui, to a cabin in the woods for a vacation. Shortly after arriving, they are held captive by four individuals, Leonard, played by Dave Bautista (“Guardians of the Galaxy,” “Glass Onion”), Sabrina, played by Nikki Amuka-Bird (“Old,” “The Personal History of David Copperfield”), Redmond, played by Rupert Grint (“Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix,” “Servant”), and Adriane, played by Abby Quinn (“Landline,” “Little Women (2019)”), who believe that the apocalypse will soon arrive and the only way they can stop it is by sacrificing either Eric or Andrew and that their family must make the choice themselves.
Shyamalan is a director who clearly seems to work best with smaller scale productions and that is abundantly clear here. Not only is he able to squeeze a ton out of a relatively short runtime at exactly 100 minutes, but his actors are able to give tremendous performances with little to work off of. Aldridge and Groff are fantastic and magnetic, with not just excellent chemistry but the dramatic chops to make the script’s hokier elements work. Amuka-Bird, Grint, and Quinn are all great, delivering different interpretations of people faced with this kind of end of the world philosophy to interesting results. However, Bautista truly steals the show and may just deliver the finest performance of his career. He is utterly fantastic, with a magnetic personality and the kind of mannerisms and ticks that provide a truly otherworldly kind of role.
There isn’t much to speak of in terms of production design, but that works in this film’s favor. The small scale of the cabin and surrounding forest create a captivating and claustrophobic environment and adds to the continually building sense of dread throughout the film. That cabin itself also proves to be a character as the film goes on, being hacked at, attacked, and brutalized as things go on. Shyamalan does a great job of slowly showcasing the environment, developing it to the point where the viewer can almost see the layout in their head as things go on. The score from Herdís Stefánsdóttir (“Y: The Last Man,” “The Sun is also a Star”) sells this even further, slowly chewing away at your nerves as things pan and move around the cabin.
For as great as the production design and individual performances are, there are two aspects that hold the film back. In the script from Shyamalan and co-writers Steve Desmond and Michael Sherman there’s an overreliance on flashbacks to communicate a few aspects that, frankly, don’t even need any flashbacks to come across, let alone as many as they give them. The editing also feels weird in a handful of spots, breaking the tension and pulling you out of the experience. These elements weaken the otherwise strong atmosphere of the movie and while they don’t take too much away from the film itself, it's worth noting.
Apart from that, this is a really solid and well executed thriller, with some great performances propping up the story. It lacks any particular elements, besides Bautista’s performance, that elevate it to classic territory, but that doesn’t sour what’s already here. Shyamalan is turning in some of his best work in years, effectively cranking up the tension with a sharp tale that just relies a bit too much on showing versus telling in some elements, while excelling in that aspect in others. It’s nevertheless an engrossing, if a bit frustrating, thrilling effort from Shyamalan and his crew and should represent a second (third) renaissance for the director, provided he sticks to the smaller scale stuff. 4/5
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