What has A Quiet Place wrought? The alien-invasion horror hit that used silence to amp up pressure in its rural setting was brilliantly executed. As a result of the film’s ravenous extraterrestrial creatures chase sound, the characters do not communicate aloud, and even their viewers feels the strain to not scream. A Quiet Place‘s success with critics and audiences not solely spurred a sequel (A Quiet Place Half II) and a prequel (A Quiet Place: Day One), but in addition opportunistic imitators, wanting to take the muted gimmick to make their unaffiliated films stand out.
Final fall, author/director Brian Duffield hit Hulu with a strikingly comparable idea in No One Will Save You, during which Kaitlyn Dever stars as a rustic woman affected by invading aliens whereas she would not say a phrase. With Christmas got here John Woo’s deeply dismal motion dud Silent Evening, during which Joel Kinnaman performs a vengeance-fueled anti-hero who, due to a scarring act of violence, is unable to vocalize — however for no obvious motive, nobody else talks round him both. Now comes Azrael, a horror collaboration from Low cost Thrills director E.L. Katz and You are Subsequent author Simon Barrett. Regardless of the noteworthy expertise hooked up, it too leans exhausting into this scream-free gimmick that may’t make up for its flimsy storytelling.
What’s Azrael about?
Written by Barrett and helmed by Katz, Azrael stars Samara Weaving because the titular younger girl who just isn’t solely named after the Angel of Dying however can also be a part of a post-apocalyptic cult dwelling deep within the woods, below a vow of silence. Blood-red textual content splashes throughout the display screen to succinctly introduce the massive rule of the cult: Do not communicate; or else evil will come.
In a rugged village, the cultists worship the wind that rips by their drafty church bedecked with crucifixes. They convey with one another by stern glances and huffs of air. It appears a comparatively peaceable place, save for his or her ritual of human sacrifice. Silence or not, one thing must be fed to the vampire-like creatures that shamble by the woods looking for human blood.
Chosen by her neighborhood to be fed to the Nosferatu-looking ghouls, Azrael is certain to a chair, the place she is left like that poor goat in Jurassic Park — a meal to be loved tied up and alive. However this intelligent woman breaks her approach free, not solely setting the ghouls upon her traitorous neighborhood but in addition looking them down so she would possibly stay. It is a story filled with graphic violence that is greatest described as gloppy, however the plot is achingly skinny: Survive.
Azrael appears like a brief movie stretched past its limits.
Barrett and Katz have histories with horror anthology franchises ABCs of Dying and V/H/S, which sew collectively a set of creepy shorts with some tenuous throughline or framing gadget. Azrael feels prefer it started as a brief pitch that wasn’t developed to its full potential earlier than being unleashed on the world.
Mashable Prime Tales
A part of the issue is that the plot line is thinner than Weaving’s well-groomed brows. Regardless of plopping in a boyfriend (Candyman‘s Nathan Stewart-Jarrett) for Azrael to attempt to rescue, a camp chief who has critical glower energy (Katariina Unt), and a hapless passerby bewildered by her predicament, there may be nothing substantial to this story. The lore round what occurred to the world, what the creatures within the woods are, or how the cult got here to be all are largely irrelevant. And admittedly, that is advantageous. These particulars do not matter to Azrael as she’s simply attempting to get by the night time, so that they needn’t matter to her viewers. However there’s one thing essential missing right here: character.
As a result of Azrael has no dialogue, her actions turn into her main character definition. And that leaves us with little or no. She likes to kiss her boyfriend. She made him a bracelet from twigs. And he or she would not wish to be eaten alive by forest vampires. It is relatable, however not a lot to get invested in. Azrael is a gesture towards a Closing Woman archetype — candy and resilient, however with no depth to make her come alive.
Mainly, Barrett and Katz take without any consideration the viewers would possibly wish to perceive the heroine they comply with by a grueling night time of mayhem and homicide. Or perhaps they thought casting Weaving would carry with it sufficient viewers goodwill to paper over the lazily scripted protagonist. In any case, style followers lapped up each depraved smile, snarky rejoinder, and curse-laden rant Weaving delivered in The Babysitter, Weapons Akimbo, and Prepared or Not. However Azrael is not like these films.
This silent premise rob viewers’s of Weaving’s sharp comedic timing and her plain attraction as a foul-mouthed badass. It isn’t a frolicking collision of playful plotlines and ultra-violence. It is a grim and grisly non secular pilgrimage that is gleeful in gore but simply not enjoyable.
The silent gimmick suffocates Azrael.
In A Quiet Place, the household could not vocalize safely, however they did discuss to one another by signal language. This gave the actors a approach not solely to precise their character’s ideas, but in addition a grounded world from which to construct the supernatural scares. In Azrael, the cult theatrically scowls or smiles or sighs closely to get their factors throughout. The result’s a near-comical pantomime, studying as a crude reenactment of silent movie appearing. All of the performances right here depend on stricken faces, stern brows, or silent screaming. It is off-putting and goofy greater than impactful or horrifying.
Maybe Katz was striving for an environment that felt removed from grounded within the acquainted, vibrating as an alternative with uncooked emotion, heady ambiance, and terror. However with no dialogue nor any outlined characters to cling to, plus an episodic construction nakedly designed to favor sloppy slays over story, this non secular horror flick feels horrid however humdrum. There’s not sufficient for audiences to sink their enamel into. Whereas filled with blood and slicked with non secular symbols, Azrael performs like an empty parlor trick — not even an inexpensive thrill.
Azrael opens in theaters Sept. 27.
UPDATE: Sep. 26, 2024, 5:44 p.m. EDT Azrael was reviewed on March 13, 2024, out of SXSW 2024. This evaluation has been up to date for its theatrical launch.
