The Strangers - Movie Review

I am a huge horror movie fan, and I love scaring myself by watching horror movies. So recently I rented a copy of 'the strangers' and me and my friends sat down and watched it together, in hope that we would scare ourselves for fun! I rented it from Blockbusters, and I think it was around £3 to rent for a few days.

So the storyline of the strangers, is quite simple. Kristen and James had just come back from a wedding, and they go to stay at their parents summer home for the night. But they soon realise that they are not alone, and that 3 masked strangers are watching them, and soon they start getting terrorized.

At the start of the film it says 'inspired by true events' and that for me, is what made this film extra scary and creepy. The thought that it can actually happen to you.

There isn't really any gory moments in this film until the end, but even at the end it isn't very gory. Which I actually liked, as I don't see how gory things can actually be scary. However all though there wasn't much gore, there was quite a few moments that made you jump, and I love horror movies that make you jump.

This film didn't really have that much of a storyline, and I felt for ¾ of the film, it was just the couple hiding and running from the masked strangers, and that was about it. Yes there were jumpy and scary moments, but I think I prefer horror movies with more of a storyline.

I think the director did do a good job of the way this film was filmed, the way it was filmed when things 'popped out' made it scarier as you don't expect it, and the camera didn't keep moving around the place like it does in some films, so you can see clearly what is happening. The setting for the film was ideal. The holiday home was in a very quite place with trees surrounding it, etc. The perfect setting for a horror movie!

The cast was very small, there are obviously the 3 masked strangers, then Kristen and James, and their friend Mike. The strangers didn't actually say hardly anything, in the whole film they probably said about 5 lines. For some people this may be annoying that they didn't say much, but I found that it was scarier that they weren't speaking.

I found that Liv Tyler (Kristen) and Scott Speedman (James) fitted the role of the young couple perfectly. They were both good at playing the victims however I thought that Scott Speedman who played James was especially good.

The film was a typical horror movie, there weren't really any twists or anything like some horror films you get, and at some points it was predictable. And there were moments when you were thinking 'just stay in your hiding place and you'll be fine' but no they go and do stupid things like run outside into the middle of the field where the strangers will obviously be able to see you. If it was in real life, they actually had a good chance of killing the 3 strangers, but they did stupid things like leave each other when they only had one weapon between them. It made the film more frustrating and it would have been much more scarier if they didn't do such stupid things as it wouldn't have been so predictable. However the film did create a lot of tension and you knew something was going to happen, which made it scary. The music played throughout the film was also very creepy and chilling, as at some parts it isn't the typical horror movie music you would expect, but you just have to watch it to find out what I mean.

Overall the film did have quite a few jumpy scary moments, but it was also quite slow paced and not much happened in the film apart from them running and hiding from the strangers, and it wasn't a very developed storyline. I must say that I was a little let down by the ending. But overall it did give me and my friends a few scares and there were some really creepy moments in the film, so it was quite good, but I think it just had the potential to be a bit better.