BREAKING IN (Unviersal Home Video Blu-ray Review)

Directed By: James McTeigue
Written By: Ryan Engle
Starring: Gabrielle Union, Billy Burke, Richard Cabral
Color/88 Minutes/PG-13
Region A
Release Date: August 7, 2018
Blu-ray/DVD/Digital HD

The Film
After the recent death of her father a mother (Gabrielle Union) brings her kids to his sprawling estate to prepare it for sale but find that the house is already occupied by a group of criminals looking for the safe they believe is hidden and full of cash. With her family in mortal danger Union must fight back to save their lives.

Let's start with the good, shall we? Gabrielle Union is pretty decent here, capable of handling the physical and emotional sides of her character well. The on-location shooting at a real house gives a sense of realism to the film even if the house is an absolute mansion compound with state of the art of security that no normal person could ever dream of affording. Director James McTeigue makes good use of the location. Otherwise the film sets itself up to be a digestible slice of Hollywood despite being something unremarkable or particularly memorable and that is perfectly fine. Not every movie has to be groundbreaking or a new spin on a genre. BREAKING IN, for the first half of the film was on its way to being that.

And then the bottom dropped out.

The second half of BREAKING IN is a train wreck filled with plot holes the size of the Grand Canyon, editing that if I called it sloppy I'd be extremely kind and forgiving because it is really just plain awful, performances from the cast that are simply not good but to be fair that's really due in part to the writing at this point as well. The entire movie asks you to overlook so many inconsistencies for the sake of convenience for itself and the situations it wants to set up that it is downright insulting.

Cookie cutter isn't necessarily a bad thing. I like when my cookies are the same size and I know what to expect when I bite in to them. You won't win any fancy awards or be the next big thing making cookie cutter cookies but you can at least make a product that the party will enjoy. BREAKING IN is the equivalent to biting into a cookie and finding out that chocolate chip is actually a cockroach and nobody wants to eat a cockroach.

The Audio & Video
Universal's Blu-ray of BREAKING IN is gorgeous. The 1080p presentation looks stellar, with deep, inky black levels that show no signs of compression or blocking issues. Colors are vivid and lifelike while detail levels are very high including finer detail like facial hair and surface textures. The audio is crisp and clear with a strong mix across the 5.1 lossless audio mix. From a technical standpoint this release is top notch.

The Extras
There are several featurettes included in the release taking us behind the scenes to look at various aspects of the filmmaking including Gabrielle Union's performance and her role as a protective mother, James McTeigue's direction and use of the real life location the movie was produced in and the film's action scenes. Also included is an alternate opening and deleted and extended scenes each with optional commentary from the director and a full length audio commentary track from the director and writer.

The Bottom Line
BREAKING IN had the potential to be a standard but altogether successful home invasion thriller but it completely falls apart and descends into the type of movie that if you're not rolling your eyes at it you're simply staring wide-eyed at the screen in amazement of how ludicrous what you're watching is.

BREAKING IN is available HERE

THE STRANGERS: PREY AT NIGHT (2018)

USA/2018

Directed By: Johannes Roberts

Written By: Bryan Bertino, Ben Katai

Starring: Bailee Madison, Christina Hendricks, Emma Bellomy

The Strangers hit theaters in 2008 and found great success at the box office despite mixed reviews. I found the movie to be a tense and altogether unnerving home invasion film. The trio of killers, two female and one male each wearing a different mask, were relentless but patient, and certainly cold and calculating. They seemed to take as much joy in the process as they did the kill. When asked by one of their victims why they were doing this they offered a simple response; "Because you were home." It offered no insight or sense of reasoning and made for a chilling scene. A decade later the film holds up, aided by its score that sets the atmosphere which is a backbone for the film. 

Now a decade later a sequel has been released. THE STRANGERS: PREY AT NIGHT features a similar plot as the trio of killers stalk a family who plan to spend some time with relatives before dropping their daughter off at a boarding school. The secluded park is mysteriously empty and it doesn't take long for the masked killers to begin preying on the family but find resistance from the teenage brother and sister who fight for their survival with every ounce of strength they have. 

THE STRANGERS: PREY AT NIGHT sounds like a very similar sequel on paper, and in many ways it is but instead of focusing on tension and building suspense this sequel takes a more is more approach and turns the film into an almost straight forward slasher film, complete with final girl. The tone of the film has shifted from stalking and atmosphere to bigger and louder like literally driving a truck into the trailer's living room. I wouldn't say The Strangers was a smart film, certainly effective but it isn't smarter than your average home invasion film but it's successor certainly is dumber. And bloodier. There's no shortage of blood in the original film but there's no holding back here, even giving us a couple of gorier shots but it's not enough for the film to fall back on to become a full blown slasher. The film still wants to be a tension based home invasion horror film and keeps its roots in that area but it desperately wants to fit in with the best slasher films of the 80s. There's plenty of 80s nostalgia thrown shamelessly at the audience and two of the moments during the climax and end of the film are embarrassingly cliched ripoffs from Christine and The Texas Chainsaw Massacre. Groan inducing describes it pretty well. 

There's two sides to every coin though and some of that 80s nostalgia simply works at least in a single scene vaccum. Blasting Bonnie Tyler's "Total Eclipse Of The Heart" while a boy fights for his life alongside and in a pool while the music fades in and out as the boy goes underwater and comes up for each breath and the entire scene is drenched in the rainbow of light from neon palm trees. Maybe it's my fondness for the song but I believe this scene oozes style and is fucking brilliantly done. In fact there's plenty of moments that the movie shows a visual flare that I really dig, to the point where as the closing credits rolled I thought "If I was making a slasher film I'd want the cinematographer of this film to shoot it for me." and after looking up Ryan Samul's other credits I'm not totally surprised as he's shot some good looking horror films over the last 15 years including Stake Land and Mulberry Street. And I have to give a mention to Bailee Madison who stars as the troubled daughter Kinsey, the lead that the film revolves around. While the acting in the movie is all decent and more than competent, I think Madison proves she can play the final girl pretty well and I wouldn't mind seeing her in more horror films. 

THE STRANGERS: PREY AT NIGHT is confused, not knowing what it wanted to be. It's too into being a nostalgia act for slashers to successfully reproduce what worked about the original but it isn't even a good slasher when you get down to it. I didn't totally hate it, I loved how it looked and the music choices, I really loved one scene, but it's a mess and I'm not totally surprised as I haven't yet found a film from director Johannes Roberts that I am a fan of. I can't say my expectations weren't met as I didn't have any but I was at least a bit hopeful that it would be a surprise hit to me like its predecessor. Alas THE STRANGERS: PREY AT NIGHT is at best a harmless cliche and at worst a shitty nostalgia act. I've seen some reviews absolutely tearing it apart and I don't think it's that bad, not even close but it definitely isn't good. 

But damn, do I love that pool scene. 

Mischief Night (DVD Review) RLJ Entertainment

USA/2013
Directed By: Richard Schenkman
Written By: Jesse Baget, Eric D. Wilkinson, Richard Schenkman
Starring: Noell Coet, Daniel Hugh Kelly, Charlie O'Connell
Color/86 Minutes/Not Rated
Region 1

The Film
Emily is a high school aged teen, left blind from an accident that left her mother dead. On this night, October 30th, the night before Halloween, Mischief Night, she has finally arranged a date for her dad after years of not dating since the loss of his wife. Emily is excited that her dad has agreed to let her visit her boyfriend's family's cabin for the weekend and is ready to enjoy a quiet evening while her dad gets back in to the dating game. 

There are a few mischievous kids who egg the house as is commonplace on this night and it begins to creep out Emily a bit along with the feeling that Emily has that she is being stalked. And stalked she is, a man in a yellow rain jacket with black and white face paint/mask are stalking the in and around the house waiting for their perfect moment to attack Emily. 

MISCHIEF NIGHT is a solid home invasion horror film featuring a few really creepy scenes and some quality suspense. The director does a good job creation tension with our blind lead and Noell Coet really pulls off playing the blind lead brilliantly. The movie suffers from a "been there, done that" feeling that we've seen this all before. The bit of a twist in the story that our lead girl is blind ends up being much less interesting in the grand scheme of than it could have been and most of the characters are fairly cookie cutter. That isn't to say it is a bad movie because despite it being anything exceptional, it is a well crafted home invasion film that is pretty entertaining. This movie is superior to The Purge which features a fairly similar premise and a much bigger budget.


The Audio & Video
MISCHIEF NIGHT receives a solid DVD presentation from RLJ Entertainment. The audio, which plays a large role for our lead character is mixed well and comes across very clean and clear. The mix between dialogue and sound effects and the score is well done and we're able to relate to what Emily is going through while enjoying being a viewer at the same time. The video side of things is mainly a strong effort with only scenes that are heavy in blacks suffering from blocking and compression issues. Luckily the film is darkly lit through almost all of it but lighting it well done to keep unnecessary black levels out of the picture which the disc benefits from.

 
The Extras
The disc's lone special feature is a 12 minute behind the scene's featurette that features some interview time with various cast members and a nice look at filming and what worked and what didn't with the writers and director.

The Bottom Line
The film would have been better suited for this title had there been a bit more Halloween and Mischief Night atmosphere as there was very little. As it sits it is a competent home invasion horror film with a very likable lead that performs better than many other films of this type from recent years. 

MISCHIEF NIGHT is available HERE