Unsane Film Review & A Quiet Place Film Review

A great horror has become as rare as my movie reviews. Nevertheless, I'm here to kill two birds with one stone with my reviews for Unsane and A Quiet Place. Before you read, though, what do you think of introducing sound-sensitive alien monsters into cinemas worldwide to deal with the sub-humans of society who don't know how to shut up during a film? Could this be a lucrative idea? I'm curious to hear your thoughts so comment below!

Unsane

Sawyer Valentini is the victim of a past stalking who’s struggling to adjust back to normal life. But when she visits a counsellor to discuss her problems, she unwittingly commits herself to be locked up in a psychiatric ward, where she also learns her ex-stalker is one of the wardens.

Claire Foy shines as Sawyer, in a disturbing demonstration of the apparent effortlessness needed in being institutionalised. The Blair Witch Project’s Joshua Leonard also stars as the skin-crawling stalker, in a film that’s not too dissimilar in its surrealism.

You might be surprised to learn that director Steven Soderbergh shot the film using only an iPhone, but the result is a look that only makes for more uncomfortable viewing. This underrated method of filmmaking also leaves you feeling incredibly claustrophobic from the get-go.

Verdict: Taut, tense and suffocating, this psychological thriller is one of a kind. Perhaps it owes its thanks to an iPhone of all things, or maybe it’s simply been too long since we’ve seen such a film that’s surprisingly linear and doesn’t care much for ambiguity and convolution.

A Quiet Place

John Krasinski directs and stars in this suspense horror alongside wife Emily Blunt. Living in a world recently ravaged by ferocious alien creatures who respond to the smallest of noises, the Abbotts must abide by one rule: don’t make a single sound.

Rare is it nowadays that a horror leans heavily on its ability to generate tension, usually opting for cheap jump scares or grotesque violence. But A Quiet Place masterfully weaves pure suspense with raw tension, all the while saying or showing very little as it does.

This healthy balance doesn’t just make for a carefully-crafted horror piece, though, as it leaves enough space for some much-needed humanity – a layer that is often mistakenly cast to the side by most in the genre, yet remains the main ingredient needed to amplify the fear factor.

Verdict: With a sci-fi element that’s subtle yet wholesome at the same time, much like all of its other tricks, A Quiet Place isn’t just refreshing – it’s enough to restore your faith in this long-since exhausted genre.