A Quiet Place (2018) - A silence-driven, nail-biting monster horror smash for Krasinski & Co.

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+ Best Horror Movie of the Year + Best Apocalyptic Movie of the Year + Best Screen Couple of the Year: John Krasinski & Emily Blunt

A simple yet effective poster solely featuring Emily Blunt for John Krasinski's A Quiet Place

In a post-apocalyptic America, where strange monsters hunt and kill anything that makes a sound, a family has made a precarious life for themselves on a corn farm.

A Quiet Place is written by Bryan Woods (Her Summer (2004)), Scott Beck (The Bride Wore Blood (2006)) and great Massachusettsan co-writer-director-star John Krasinski (Brief Interviews with Hideous Men (2009)), whose third directorial work (besides 3 episodes of The Office (2010-12)) it is.
Evoking memories of such fine films as Alien (1979), Children of the Corn (1984), Predator (1987) and Signs (2002, A Quiet Place is still its own beast, working suspense magic on a good, traditional family structure and a powerful premise of silence and strong scares, which is established before the title shows.
The film works for many reasons: It has a good script that sets up simple, frightening scenes deftly; a fundamentally exciting central couple in Krasinski and his real-life wife Emily Blunt (Empire (2005), miniseries), who raises the bar with maternal power SPOILER and a couple of terrifying scenes concerning her giving birth alone, silently, and in mortal danger. The family has a conflict that drives much of the film's potent drama, which is between the father and the eldest of the children, the deaf daughter who is portrayed wonderfully by Millicent Simmonds (Wonderstruck (2017)). Noah Jupe (Wonder (2017)) as her brother, who is mighty scared for most of the film, is also good here. There is great sound design, including a lot of silence, - and countless cinema experiences are no-doubt ruined by pointless laughing and belching from teenagers and others who rightly should be caged securely somewhere, - mixed with an expert score from Marco Beltrami (The Shallows (2016)). Truly fine cinematography from Charlotte Bruus Christensen (Fences (2016)) and terse editing by Christopher Tellefsen (The Village (2004)) also distinguish the movie.
A Quiet Place strikes with a pointed, effective simplicity and is a great, nail-biting horror experience. Its horrible-looking monsters get their share of attention, but the gruesome stuff doesn't overwhelm the picture, SPOILER which is also noteworthy for highlighting an alternative usefulness of hearing aids. 

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John Krasinski: 2018 in films - according to Film Excess [UPDATED I]
2018 in films - according to Film Excess
13 Hours/13 Hours: The Secret Soldiers of Benghazi (2016) - Bay portrays controversial recent history in generally thrilling actioner (leading actor)
Big Miracle (2012) or, Those Three Whales Must Live! (leading actor)
Promised Land (2012) or, Let's Get Your Small Town A-fracka-lackin'! (leading actor)
Away We Go (2009) or, Where Do We Start This Family? (leading actor)
It's Complicated (2009) - Meyers' delightful romcom star vehicle (supporting actor)

Watch a trailer for the film here

Cost: 17-21 mil. $
Box office: 207.5 mil. $ and counting
= Mega-hit (at least 9.88 times the cost)
[A Quiet Place premiered 9 March (South by Southwest Film Festival, Austin, Texas) and runs 95 minutes. Paramount bought Woods and Beck's spec script in March 2017 and fast-tracked the project: Krasinski rewrote it and cast his wife upon her request. Shooting took place from May - November 2017 in New York. The film opened #1 to a sensational 50.2 mil. $ first weekend in North America, - following a rave welcome at the Austin festival, - spent the 2nd week at #2, before climbing to #1 again for its third weekend. It has grossed a tremendous 132.7 mil. $ (64 % of the total gross) domestically so far. Its 2nd and 3rd biggest markets are currently the UK with 9 mil. $ (4.3 %) and Australia with 6.6 mil. $ (3.2 %). The film has coming releases in 3 May in Hungary, Portugal, Slovakia, 9 May in Belgium, 18 May in China - a rare feat for a Western film of its size and particularly for a horror, - and 20 June in France. Its gross may easily even top 300 mil. $. Stephen King has called the film "an extraordinary piece of work." Krasinski does not have another directing job lined up yet but is starring in Amazon's coming Tom Clancy's Jack Ryan (2018-) TV-series, which has already been extended for a 2nd season. Blunt returns in Mary Poppins Returns (2018). A Quiet Place is certified fresh at 95 % with an 8.2 critical average at Rotten Tomatoes.]

What do you think of A Quiet Place?

A Nightmare on Elm Street (2010) - Another terrible remake of a horror classic

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Jackie Earle Haley awaits us as the new Freddy Krueger in Samuel Bayer's A Nightmare on Elm Street

A group of youths from the same high school begin to get the same nightmare of a disfigured man in a striped sweater with a knife-hand that can cut them in reality!

A Nightmare on Elm Street is a shamefully uninspired remake of Wes Craven's 1984 classic of the same title, written by Wesley Strick (Doom (2005)) and Eric Heisserer (Final Destination 5 (2011)) and directed by music video director Samuel Bayer (Max (2005), short), making his feature debut. The film even allows itself to give Strick a separate story credit, although the story is all Craven's.
Nightmare starts by focusing on a young blond, who looks like a 25 year-old porn star, but who is supposed to be a regular high school girl. Her mother of course looks like an about two year older sister. SPOILER Then she dies, and we get a new protagonist, an increasingly bleary-eyes Rooney Mara (Carol (2015)). She and Kyle Gallner (Red State (2011)) make an honest attempt here, but they can far from save this a bit more ornery version of the original story, which remains a good one.
Worst about the Nightmare remake is that the personality is stripped from its iconic villain, Freddy Krueger, and that the film doesn't have the strange dream-state horror of the original. Jackie Earle Haley (Watchmen (2009)) as Freddy is stuck with a mask so tight that he can give the role neither facial expressions nor real life. It's awful. Connie Britton (The Lather Effect (2006)) has good hair in the film, SPOILER but has an ungrateful role and ends up getting her eyes splatted out.
A Nightmare on Elm Street must be among the year's worst films.

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2010 in films and TV-series - according to Film Excess [UPDATED III]
2010 in films and TV-series - according to Film Excess [UPDATED II]
2010 in films and TV-series - according to Film Excess [UPDATED I]
A Nightmare on Elm Street (1984) or, Don't Fall Asleep!

Here's a promo clip for the film

Cost: 35 mil. $
Box office: 115.6 mil. $
= Box office success
[A Nightmare on Elm Street premiered April 27 (Hollywood) and runs 95 minutes. As part of the film's development, it was decided to take the witticism away from the new Krueger, have him look more like a real burn victim and also change him from only a child murderer to also a child molester. Filming took place from May - July 2009 in Illinois and Indiana. The film opened #1 with a 32.2 mil. $ first weekend in North America, where it fell a steep 72 % in its second week but still made #2 and eventually grossed 63 mil. $ (54.5 % of the total gross). The 2nd and 3rd biggest markets were Russia with 5.7 mil. $ (4.9 %) and the UK with 5 mil. $(4.3 %). Haley is contracted for two sequels, Mara for one, but development of any sequel has stood still since the film's release, and Bayer has not done a film since. A Nightmare on Elm Street is rotten at 15 % with a 3.7 critical average on Rotten Tomatoes.]

What do you think of the remake of A Nightmare on Elm Street?