The Strangers (2008)
Our home is generally conceived as a sanctuary, a warm, comfortingly familiar bubble of security designed to protect us from the dangers and uncertainties of the outside world. As long as we lock our doors and windows, nobody else can infiltrate it, and if we've done nothing to earn the ire of others, why would anybody want to? Right? But what if we happen to be in the wrong place at the wrong time, even if said "wrong place" is our very own home? What if we have done absolutely nothing wrong to anybody, but there just so happens to be a certain group of depraved individuals who thrive on causing pain and terror to the most innocent, unsuspecting human beings who have done nothing more than simply exist in their surrounding area? And they do it just because they can, because they enjoy it, because the selected targets were home.
That is the unnerving premise examined to its fullest, bleakest potential in writer-director Bryan Bertino's tense, nerve-racking, unrelentingly terrifying, and ultimately heart-shattering home-invasion thriller masterpiece, The Strangers. As trite as this may sound, you may never feel quite as safe at night in your own home again after watching this movie. Especially if you happen to live in the middle of practically nowhere, surrounded by the mystery and menace of the woods. And you should make triple certain that you've locked every door and window before going to sleep. Not that that will guarantee your safety or anything, so bluntly says Bertino.
In a haunting touch that recalls John Larroquette's brilliant narration in the opening of Tobe Hooper's The Texas Chainsaw Massacre, an unknown but grippingly deep and solemn male voice (possibly Larroquette?) informs us that, according to the FBI, there are an estimated 1.4 million violent crimes committed in America each year. Much like the aforementioned 1974 slasher classic, we're also ominously informed that the events to which we are about to bear witness are inspired by true events. While that may come across as an overused gimmick in modern horror nowadays, that doesn't stop the chills from slithering up the spine when delivered by the right narrator, and the unknown voice at the start of The Strangers is most certainly right for the job.
It's the night of February 11th, 2005. Kristen McKay (Liv Tyler) and James Hoyt (Scott Speedman) are a young, longtime couple who have just left a friend's wedding reception and are on their way to the latter's family summer home. "The brutal events that took place there are still not entirely known," says the narrator. (This single line instantly imbues the audience with an air of fatalism; no matter what is about to transpire, the implication is neither protagonist will make it out with their lives.) From the moment we are silently introduced to the couple at the center of the story, it's painfully apparent they've just been through a trauma. Their car is sitting motionlessly in front of a traffic light. The road appears to be deserted, with no other cars anywhere in sight. Cinematographer Peter Sova captures their faces in close-up, highlighting the tears that have dried up beneath their despondent eyes. The red and green lights illuminate their faces in the otherwise pitch-black night. James' hands grip the steering wheel tightly. Without a single line of dialogue, Bertino efficiently and meticulously conveys through his actors and camerawork that this couple has hit a serious roadblock from which they may never recover. Within the first moments, we are inexplicably endeared to these two characters and hope the best for their wellbeing, both emotional and physical.
Upon arriving at the summer home, James calls his best friend, Mike (Glenn Howerton), to ask him to pick him up in the morning, vaguely disclosing that things "didn't work out the way I planned at all." Kristen stands outside the front door smoking a cigarette. Roses have been scattered around various areas in the house, including the bathtub. As Kristen falls asleep while taking a bath, Bertino treats us to a flashback from earlier in the night. At the wedding reception, James carries Kristen out into the freezing cold to tell her something. He takes a blue ring box out of his pocket, and Kristen stares at him with an expression of pure astonishment. "I knew it the first time I ever saw you," he romantically states. At a loss for words, she lowers her head, as though she's just been punched in the stomach. Everything these two have built together is about to come crashing down in a second. Bertino returns us to the present. He inserts a shot of the ring box sitting on the kitchen table. Bertino shows respect for his audience by trusting them to use the context clues he's laid out to piece together the source of his protagonists' tension, as opposed to spelling it out with lazily expository dialogue or showing the flashback in its entirety. The moment Kristen lowers her head, Bertino cuts back to the present shot of her sleeping in the tub. Kristen and James sit across from one another at the kitchen table, physically close but emotionally light years apart. They can barely make eye contact, and speak in hushed voices. "I'm so sorry it wasn't the way you thought it would be," Kristen mournfully whispers. "I'm really sorry."
We are witnessing the tragic end of a once-passionate relationship. However, while the palpable love between Kristen and James is dwindling, it isn't yet deceased. After James puts on a romantic ballad on his record, Kristen wraps her arms around his chest and rests her head against his back, slowly turning him around in a mutual embrace. Almost imperceptibly, a spark has been seemingly reignited. They begin to kiss, James removing Kristen's underwear. Is this one final expression of their love before saying goodbye, or are they now officially on the road to reconciliation? No matter. A knock is suddenly made on the front door, startling the heated couple out of their intimacy. The time is 4:05 in the morning. Who could possibly be knocking on their door at this hour? Bizarrely, it's a young, blonde woman (Gemma Ward) whose face is almost entirely obscured by the blackness of the night. James flips the switch to the porch light repeatedly, but it refuses to cooperate. She asks if someone named "Tamara" is home. James tells her she's got the wrong house. "Are you sure?" she asks, her voice deep but strangely sensuous. Again, James assures her that no one by that name lives here. The woman stands still, staring at them. Bertino has a knack for lingering on the most discomforting moments in his story, and this one is no exception. Following this prolonged moment of awkward stillness, the woman calmly walks away, casually stating, "See you later." James contemplates going after the mysterious lost woman, but Kristen claims she seemed fine, and would most likely have said if she wasn't.
With the mood of romance back to nonexistent, James offers to buy Kristen a new pack of cigarettes, saying he wants to drive on his own for a while. He lights Kristen a fire and tells her they can talk some more when he gets back if she wants. All alone in the house, Kristen changes out of her dress and tries on the ring she wasn't ready to accept. Soon, the woman from earlier knocks at the door once again, asking if Tamara is home. Kristen reminds her that she already came by here, to which she asks, "Are you sure?" Kristen locks the door. The smoke from the fireplace sets off the shrill fire alarm. Kristen stands on a chair to loosen it from the ceiling, and the second it falls to the floor, another knock is made. She tries to call James on her cellphone, but it's out of power. She plugs it into a charger and calls James on a bedroom phone, informing him the woman has returned and won't stop knocking on the door. The connection is suddenly broken. Bertino deviously uses the placement of objects captured by his camera to get our heartbeats pumping faster: the smoke alarm that was previously seen on the floor has now been moved to a chair; Kristen's phone that was plugged in beside the fireplace is now missing. Strange, ear-splitting noises are being made outside, like the sound of a chair being dragged in front of the door and knives scraping against each other. Bertino and Sova judiciously maintain their focus on Kristen, never once leaving her side to show us what's going on behind the door. We are locked completely in her perspective, hearing the loud noises, the repeated bangs on the door, clueless as to who is making them and why. This method of intimately suffocating perspective filmmaking, combined with Liv Tyler's phenomenally emotive performance, engenders tremendous compassion and empathy for our petrified heroine. We're every bit as paralyzed with fear as she is, equally trapped inside this forebodingly spacious home, in the dark. The numerous rooms lose their sense of safety, superseded by their availability for anyone to hide.
Arming herself with a kitchen knife, Kristen uses it to pull back a curtain in a bedroom, revealing the horrifying face of a man (Kip Weeks) disguised under a clear white pillowcase with two eyeholes and a painted-on thin black grin. Once James returns, a hysterical Kristen tells him there are people outside hunting them, a claim he initially greets with skepticism. That is until he discovers his car vandalized and his phone smashed. Before they can make it out of the driveway, a truck pulls up, blocking their path. Inside is a masked brunette woman (Laura Margolis), who proceeds to ram her pickup truck into the back of James' car, forcing them to retreat back into the house. With no phones to call for help or neighbors to turn to, Kristen and James must depend on each other to make it through the rest of the night alive and do everything in their limited power to defend themselves against a trio of relentless sadists whose goal is to strip them of every last vestige of hope.
When Bertino began composing his masterfully spare screenplay, originally titled The Faces, he drew inspiration from primarily two sources. First and foremost, he used a traumatizing experience from childhood as the basis for his setup. As a child, Bryan and his family lived in a house on a street in the middle of nowhere. One night, while his parents were away, someone knocked on his front door. His little sister answered, and the strangers asked for someone who didn't live there. Bryan later found out these people were knocking on doors throughout the neighborhood, and if anyone didn't answer, they would break in and rob the houses. (Naturally, he's taken that scenario to the nightmarish extreme in his screenplay, crafting a group of thugs who want people to be home so they can, not rob, but torment and ultimately murder them for fun.) His second source was the infamous Manson Family murders from the summer of 1969, wherein deranged, drugged-out members of a hippie commune (one man - Tex Watson - and three women - Susan Atkins, Patricia Krenwinkel, and Leslie Van Houten) carried out the two-night orders of their leader, Charles Manson, to break into the California homes of Sharon Tate and Leno and Rosemary LaBianca, tie them up, and paint the walls in their blood. The latter source contributes a greater sense of verisimilitude to both the protagonists and their inevitable conclusion.
Similar to the victims of those two nights which effectively brought an end to the "Love Generation", Kristen and James are two commonplace, goodhearted individuals who love each other and have done nothing whatsoever to deserve the torment and pain heartlessly inflicted on them. They're not secret assassins or well-trained badasses who were raised in a survivalist milieu and are therefore now equipped to blow the heads off of anyone who poses a threat to them like Erin from You're Next. No, these are authentic, flesh-and-blood human beings already thrust into a vulnerable situation due to the sudden deterioration of their partnership. Neither one of them has fired a gun in their entire life. Neither one has probably ever been in so much as a schoolyard altercation. When they hear a knock on their door at 4 in the morning, they feel a combination of surprise and fear. When they see a masked intruder staring at them from behind a window, they scream. If their car gets rammed, they will run as fast as humanly possible into their home and look for a place to hide. While it's easy to dismiss them as a pair of hopelessly incompetent sad sacks, unsure of how to properly load a rifle, just remember the circumstances of the Tate-LaBianca victims. When Wojciech Frykowski was woken from his sleep by Tex Watson, who was aiming a .22 caliber Hi-Standard revolver at his head and told him to be quiet and not to move, can you blame him for cooperating? When Susan Atkins stormed into the bedrooms of Abigail Folger and Sharon Tate and Jay Sebring and ordered them at knifepoint to get up and go into the living room, are you seriously going to scoff at them for (mistakenly) believing that following those straightforward orders would increase their chances for survival? In a lot of ways, Kristen and James are just as realistically terrified and ill-equipped as their slain real-life counterparts. In terms of their undying love for one another, one cannot help but reflect on the suffering of the LaBiancas, who were bound beside each other on their living room couch, falsely promised they were just going to be robbed. Minutes later, Rosemary was escorted to her bedroom by Krenwinkel and Van Houten, where she was forced to helplessly listen to the guttural screams and bloody gurgling of her husband as he was stabbed to death in the living room by Watson.
By putting a strain on Kristen and James' relationship from the outset, Bertino ensures our investment in them and saturates the atmosphere with nearly unbearable tension long before the titular intruders come knocking. It's one of the many intelligent choices he makes to distinguish his slasher from the vast majority of its less emotionally grounded competitors. In fact, referring to The Strangers as a "slasher movie" can't help but feel like a repugnant disservice. Yes, there are the customary subgenre culprits -- bloodthirsty maniacs hidden in spooky masks and, for the most part, not uttering a word, characters who lose their phones and are therefore prevented from calling the police, an isolated setting backdropped with wood, the female protagonist tripping, and minimal lighting -- but the way Bertino utilizes them to advance his character-driven story makes them feel distinctly organic, fresh, and exhilarating. Apart from that, he places the emphasis on old-fashioned suspense and the psychological anguish of his characters rather than graphic displays of carnage and viscera, making The Strangers qualify as more of a psychological/suspense thriller on par with John Carpenter's Halloween, albeit with a greater sense of realism -- the villains here don't stand up and walk away after being shot six times and falling off a balcony -- and an immensely more gut-wrenching, true-to-life outcome. The comparisons to Carpenter's seminal, standard-setting holiday classic don't end there.
As an homage to the moment Michael Myers' white William Shatner mask emerges from the blackness behind a sobbing Laurie Strode, Bertino, with assistance from Peter Sova, executes a wide shot of Kristen standing in the hallway smoking her last cigarette in the foreground while, unbeknownst to her, the white pillowcase worn by the lead male assailant gradually emerges from blackness in the background. Bertino elects not to employ any music cue to accentuate the terror of this moment. Despite the incessant knocking, Kristen is comforted by the assumption she's all alone in this house. She locked the front door so no one should be able to get in. And there this man is, watching her, mocking her sense of domestic security. Bertino allows his audience to spot the ghoulish sight on their own, without the condescending aid of a loud sting on the soundtrack. It makes the emergence significantly more spine-tingling. Remember the scene where Laurie looks out the window in her English class and sees Michael standing across the street watching her motionlessly? While there's something to be said for unleashing evil in the deceptive comfort of daylight, Bertino amply proves that the scariest form of horror will always manifest in the nighttime. At one point, Kristen and James stare out a window, and Bertino offers an extreme wide shot of Dollface standing motionlessly in the street watching them. She's so far away that it's hard to tell if she's wearing a mask. Once Mike enters the house to cautiously search for Kristen and James, he pauses momentarily in the hallway, Howerton's visage of alarm framed in close-up while the man in the mask appears in soft focus in the background, wielding an axe and tilting his head a la Michael Myers. The atmospheric camerawork and lighting by Sova combine to achieve a level of artistic malevolence identical to Dean Cundey's extraordinary heavy lifting on Carpenter's production. It's possible that some artificial lighting was used to illuminate certain scenes, however, the brilliance of Sova's lighting is that it feels thoroughly natural. The Strangers boasts a look that matches the despondency of its tone: every scene up until the climax is utterly bathed in blackness. The only exterior sources of light are an array of street lamps which line the block and occasional headlights. The interior sources are limited to some dim lights and the fireplace fire, which combine to emit an orange glow throughout the home. Bertino and Sova incorporate a lot of wide exterior shots of the summer home to emphasize the suffocating sense of isolation and the menacing potential for danger lurking in the woods.
This is the furthest thing from a fun, undemanding, feel-good time at the movies. Bertino doesn't inject any tongue-in-cheek humor into the grim proceedings to ease the unrelenting tension. Our protagonists are given a sliver of hope that they have acquired the upper hand on their assailants, but it reveals itself as a fleeting tease. One character's premature arrival signifies that help could be on the way, only to meet a fate that exacerbates this harrowing ordeal for Kristen and James, the latter now having to contend with a crushing sense of guilt in addition to his unimaginable fear. Even if he were to make it out alive, he will never be free. This is cinematic horror at its most uncompromising and challenging. At times it's difficult to ascertain what's transpiring because the lighting is so dark, but that's precisely the point. We're stumbling in the dark alongside Kristen and James, searching desperately for a place to hide. Our vision and sound are limited to just about anything they can see and hear. Bertino doesn't allow us to take a breath for one single moment once the intruders make their presence known, and the horror is all the more visceral because of that. He's a director who wholeheartedly cares about the characters he's written, a trait that's elevated another maestro of modern horror, Mike Flanagan, to the big leagues.
Bertino's pacing is a master class in disciplined, restrained filmmaking. Not only does he use close-ups to accentuate the nerve-shredding terror and desperation in Tyler's vulnerable eyes, his editor, Kevin Greutert, refuses to leave her side for a split second, creating the sensation of a one-shot film. If you're expecting an abundance of quick cuts, gore-soaked action, and a tidy, cathartic ending, you've come to the wrong place, because The Strangers is undeniably, punishingly slow, but I mean that in the best way possible. It's slow in a manner that keeps you attached to the protagonists, sympathizing with their struggle, sharing in their misery, rooting for their survival, and gasping for air, begging the director to release his grip on your throat. But at the same time you're hoping he grips it a little tighter because he's so damn good at it.
While Bertino makes excessive demands on your patience, it's easy to surrender when the lead actors are as committed to the material and deserving of our emotional distress as Liv Tyler and Scott Speedman. These actors are capable of saying nothing and speaking volumes with their faces, body language, and hushed voices. For his part, Speedman is required to portray the disbelieving alpha male, unconvinced that anyone has broken into his house and talking down to his girlfriend as though she's describing the events of a nightmare. He's the type of guy who feels confident enough in the absence of real danger to go outside to get his phone from his car or ask the woman watching them across the street what she wants. In that respect, James reacts to the situation the way my father would, eager to demonstrate his bravery and shaming my mother for overreacting like a scared child. It becomes clear that James is in denial about the extent of their dilemma, and once he steps outside to find his windshield smashed to pieces, Speedman foregoes the facade of toughness and unveils the frightened, infuriated, inadequate human man lying beneath. In the opening scenes, he's extremely taciturn, conveying a quiet humiliation as he sits at the table shoveling scoops of ice cream into his mouth, unable to look Kristen in the eye, struggling to maintain a good-natured smile for more than a second. James is a deeply sympathetic character, a wounded man grappling with the pain of having his heart ripped out of his chest by the woman he was ready to devote the remainder of his life to but unable to let go of her. Speedman gives an incredibly strong, internalized performance, beautifully conveying the conflicted feelings of love and resentment within James' heart, but The Strangers is without a doubt a showcase for the magnificently heartbreaking Liv Tyler, and she delivers with a soul-stirring performance that deserves to be spoken of in the same breath as Jamie Lee Curtis, Adrienne King, and Marilyn Burns.
Like those indispensable scream queens before her, Tyler is gifted with a tremendously resilient set of pipes, letting out screams of emotionally precise, unbridled terror that pierce the eardrums as violently as they do the heart. When the intruders commence their attack on the Hoyt residence, Speedman is absent for an extended stretch of time, leaving the brunt of the acting to fall on the shoulders of Tyler, who is put through the wringer as mercilessly as an actor could dread. When the casting for Kristen was underway, apparently Thandie Newton and Oscar-winner Charlize Theron had expressed interest in the role. As committed and convincing as I'm sure either higher-caliber actress would've been, Bertino made the right choice in selecting a much lesser known talent (disregarding her name-brand association with her father) because it added to the real-world authenticity. Much like found-footage horror films have demonstrated, when the lead actors aren't instantly recognizable Hollywood icons, it's easier for audiences to immerse themselves in the reality of the story. With her slim figure, long black hair, and meek, soothingly whispery voice, Tyler is a physically perfect target, and she uses her bony features to immaculately timed effect at one point while staring intently at a wall featuring the written height development of James and his siblings as children. An unexpectedly loud knock sounds at the front door, snapping her out of her reverie so aggressively the veins in Tyler's neck bulge. She's required to cry her eyes out both softly and audibly given the intensity of the situation, and because her reactions are always grounded in believable human emotion, my heart aches for her every step of the way. While darting from the backdoor into the backyard, Kristen trips and injures her leg, and Tyler commits to the physicality of her situation by crawling across the ground and, once standing up, limping as she walks. She doesn't seemingly forget that she just tripped and proceed to walk normally as though she were invulnerable.
Naturally, the trio of actors gifted with the roles of the titular psychopaths aren't required to do much in the way of acting, but they fulfill the same function as the myriad of actors who've played Michael Myers and Jason Voorhees throughout their franchises. That is, they get to wear three amazing costumes and allow their unnerving appearances to crawl their way under our skin and infiltrate our nightmares. The man in the mask, Dollface, and Pin-Up Girl (yes, I know, their credited names are not the most creative) are three of the most sadistic villains in the history of horror, the type of patient, inhumane bullies who relish instilling fear and paranoia in their victims before going in for the kill. They're different from supernatural creatures like Jason and Freddy because, for one, they're actual human monsters, and also because they don't possess a motive for doing what they do. Unlike Michael Myers, who is merely a single-minded killing machine devoid of emotion, these three psychopaths aren't interested in simply killing. They torment their targets psychologically, banging on their doors in the middle of the night, breaking into their homes and writing taunting messages on the walls, stripping them of their sense of safety and reducing them to a quivering shell of fear. When Kristen hides in a closet, Dollface pops up to evoke a terrified scream and breaks off the slats before walking away. Thereafter Kristen and Dollface stand still across from each other in the kitchen, and Dollface drags a knife threateningly across the table, moving forward slightly and softly promising, "You're gonna die." As Kristen crawls across the lawn en route to a barn with an old radio transmitter, Pin-Up Girl walks up behind her then disappears, content with the knowledge that she could've killed her any time she wanted to. After prying the front door ajar, Dollface slides in front of the crack to show herself to Kristen, then allows her to close the door so she can resume banging on it. They don't need to consume mind-altering substances to sacrifice their humanity and inflict brutal violence on innocent strangers like the Manson Family. They bully and murder because, as far as we know, they enjoy it. And that lack of a clearly defined motivation makes them that much more terrifying and inscrutable. The costume design for each killer is brilliantly simple and distinctive, ready-made for Halloween costumes. Kip Weeks' pillowcase evokes Jason Voorhees' original pre-hockey mask look from Friday the 13th Part 2 as well as the unapprehended Phantom Killer from Texarkana. His brown suit and tie create a respectable, gentlemanly appearance that exacerbates his sadistic nature. Ward and Margolis' plastic makeup-covered masks look similar, but their contrasting hair lengths and colors (Ward's long and blonde, Margolis' short and black) distinguish them as their own recognizable entity.
Spoiler Warning: The following paragraph will disclose specific details about the climax, including the fates of both protagonists. Even though The Strangers first slashed its way into theaters sixteen years ago and has become a cult classic in the home-invasion subgenre since, if you have not seen the movie and would prefer to be surprised by the unconventional outcome, I advise you to stop reading here and return after having watched it.
Once the morning sun arrives to bring light to what seemed like an eternal darkness, Kristen and James awaken to find themselves bound beside each other to chairs, with the three masked maniacs standing silently before them. "Why are you doing this to us?" Kristen whispers. After a moment of careful reflection, Dollface delivers the clinically sickening, now-iconic reply, "Because you were home." One by one, the trio removes their masks, as if to say without words, "Now that you've seen our faces, you know what we have to do next, right?" Kristen tearfully pleads with her assailants to spare them in a manner that recalls Sharon Tate's heart-wrenching plea to Susan Atkins to let her live so she could have her baby. Much like the slain pregnant actress, Kristen's argument that they can stop falls on deaf ears. Kristen and James look at each other one last time, and Kristen reaffirms her love for him before the man in the mask inserts a kitchen knife twice in James' stomach. Kristen tells him to focus on her face, and as he struggles to do so, Pin-Up Girl takes the knife and stabs it into his chest, killing him. Kristen begs and struggles in her seat, and Dollface stabs her in the stomach several times. Similar to Alfred Hitchcock's handling of the shower scene in Psycho, Bertino tactfully films this sequence with an emphasis on the emotional suffering of his characters as opposed to visible piercings of their flesh. He shows the knife thrusting forward, but just before it makes contact with their skin, Greutert cuts to the anguished facial expressions of Tyler and Speedman. Tyler gives an especially grueling, agonizingly realistic cry of pain as the knife is inserted and twisted in her stomach. Greutert then quickly cuts away to exterior shots of the surrounding area as Tyler's cries echo faintly into the air. Without showing anything remotely exploitative, Bertino and his collaborators compose one of the most subversive, harrowing, anti-Hollywood endings in the history of horror. It doesn't cheat the audience by dumbing down the villains at the last second or injecting the protagonists with hitherto unknown heroic attributes, and it plays out the way a scenario of this sort most likely would in real life.
In the final analysis, Bertino is communicating an exceedingly pessimistic message that less open-minded horror fans may not want to hear: evil resides in all places, and in the real world, more often than not, it triumphs over good. As real-life horror stories such as the Manson Family massacres have demonstrated, the forces of benevolence and innocence rarely prevail over ones of malice. While most human beings are fundamentally decent, with care and consideration for the value of human life, there will always exist a subgroup of depraved, nihilistic individuals whose only joy in life comes from inflicting humiliation and agony on others, and as much as we may strive to ascertain a reason for such senseless violence, Bertino argues that there sometimes isn't one. Senseless violence is all there is to so-called "people" like the faceless trio he's conceived of. They cannot be reasoned with, they have no intention of obtaining material possessions to better their own lives. They exist solely to cause horror, move on, and start again with someone new. They may have the physical features of a human being, but they're deprived of anything remotely resembling humanity. They may have hearts, but there's no compassion contained within them. As Dr. Loomis accurately assessed about his homicidal patient, behind their eyes there is only blackness, the absence of a conscience. As for the homes we live in, while they may provide shelter and warmth, the illusion of safety is only that. An illusion. We can close our doors and turn the lock, but that isn't going to stop someone from smashing through it with an axe.
Pivoting masterfully from a quiet, contemplative relationship drama to a tense, suspenseful, unrelentingly vicious nightmare, Bryan Bertino has crafted the most terrifying slasher of the 2000s bar none. With an emphasis on bone-chilling dread and poignant human emotion over gruesome displays of bloodshed, and elevated by a pair of emotionally gutting performances from Liv Tyler and Scott Speedman, Bertino subverts genre norms, reinvigorates a handful of tropes that could've gone stale in a less capable filmmaker's hands, and immediately establishes himself as one of the most ambitious, audacious, and uncompromising voices in modern horror. If you're willing to take a plunge into the pitch-black underbelly of American society and undergo a true, feel-bad, no-holds-barred cinematic nightmare come to life, I advise you to give a warm, welcoming hello to The Strangers.
8.4/10
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