The Strangers: Chapter 1 (2024)

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I'm not going to surprise anyone by saying this, if they've read my reviews on the previous two 'Strangers' movies, but there's still nothing special about these movies. At one point, I even gave the villains credit for being effectively creepy, bu even that's getting stale at this point. This is one of those films that forces one to ask the question "who the hell asked for this?" Going by the idea of the movie, in that this was supposed to be a story of how the "Strangers" started out, I'd normally be pretty forgiving... but...

As it turns out, there is absolutely nothing to this movie that we have never seen before. I'm talking right down to lines of dialogue that get repeated (most famously the cold reason these killers have for doing what they do, amounting to "just because"), and kills that we've already seen, lacking creativity entirely. I'll tell you what, 'Jason X' is pretty terrible, but the flash-freeze kill in it is at least pretty damn cool. This is nothing but more of the same, and it all boils down to a misleading trailer that makes one think maybe they'll get an interesting origin story.

And so, with a deep sigh I move on and try to review what I've essentially already reviewed twice. I mean, hell, people once thought the 'Friday the 13th' movies were repetitive. This time around, we're back to two main character who we really don't care about, by the names of Maya (Madelaine Petsch) and Ryan (Froy Gutierrez); a couple driving cross country to celebrate their fifth dating anniversary. This time around, however, there's no awkward tension between the main characters, and no real sense of them "bettering" themselves in some way before the film ends. No sir, just a couple of bags of meat here!

The happy-go-lucky couple get themselves lost and stop in a town called Venus, where the locals are the modern equivalent to your average locals in an old western saloon - just always looking nasty and giving the stink-eye to anyone new in town. To no one's surprise, the couple's car "breaks down," and eventually they find themselves stalked by the trio of killers known best as "Man in Mask," or now "Scarecrow" (Matus Lajcak) "Dollface" (Olivia Kreutzova) and "Pin-Up Girl" (Letizia Fabbri), and it's all just survival horror with a similar ending to the previous ones.

It's a crying shame for me to say that this is one of the most disappointing and misleading horror movies I've seen in a while. In my own way, I had high hopes for this to actually be something creative that would tell a story of how and why the Strangers became what they became. Y'know, character development, give them a bit of a history, etc... tell an actual story. And with Renny Harlin behind the wheel, and me being a big fan of 'Elm Street 4,' I can say that the man has much better material out there.

What really blows my mind about this movie is that it's the third in a batch, and there's an apparent couple of sequels to this that are on their way. But for crying out loud, if this is something that must happen, can we get more character development in there instead of just telling the audience in so many words "you've seen everything we're doing already." With the exception of a few brief moments in tension (and that's being generous), the film is altogether predictable as ever, roughly acted, and again, and perhaps most importantly nothing new or original. Save your money on this one, folks!

I'm hard-pressed to imagine what the next two chapters will consist of, but I can say with all honesty that I'm not entirely looking forward to eventually reviewing them when they pop up. I'd love to be able to write more about some sort of interesting details about these films, but there's so little here it's almost ridiculous. At this point, I might as well review what's coming up now to keep it simple and just say "more of the same." I tend to be pretty damn forgiving towards movies, understanding that sometimes shit happens... but this is the kind of film I'd almost dub "insulting" considering just how misleading the concept it. Can it get worse?

1/5

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