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4 stars****

This was a remake of a 1987 film of the same name. I often wonder why filmmakers want to make a film we’ve all seen before. On nearly every occasion it’s the original film that stands out as the best, with very few exceptions. Fortunately, I haven’t seen the original of this movie so I was able to enter the theater with no preconceived thoughts, ideas or hopes.

I can’t help thinking that this film started the wrong way. The opening scenes gave us lots of information about the antagonist’s background. If we hadn’t known this information we would’ve spent more time wondering if the stepfather was going to be a problem or whether he was in fact an okay guy. By giving us so much information up front we knew it was just a matter of time before he intended to slay his whole new family. The early back story helped an old lady meet her end, but a different re-write could have solved that problem.

Nevertheless, the pace and direction were superbly matched to keep a high level of intrigue throughout the movie, even though we were pretty sure how it was going to end.

Written by J.S. Cardone (screenplay) Carolyn Lefcourt (story) Brian Garfield (story) Donald E. Westlake (story and earlier screenplay) the writer has managed to scare the audience on a consistent basis. The screenplay doesn’t always go in the direction that you expect. Just when the antagonist has the opportunity to kill his prey, he sometimes smiles and reacts nicely towards the heroes.

This as a movie was better than the trailer. When I saw the trailer I thought this might be an okay movie, but it turned out to be far better than that.

For a relatively small budget of 20 million this movie’s revenue have already exceeded earlier expectations, but it’s not the kind of film you can watch twice because you know exactly what happened all the way through having watched it once.

The screenplay appears to follow the standard expectations route that Hollywood demands these days. The late Blake Snyder could have used this movie as a perfect example of his suggested Save the Cat methodology of hitting all the right points at the right time.

Why the family would make so many incorrect decisions given the information they were able to obtain throughout this movie is what makes this a movie and not real life. The audience is constantly telling the actors, particularly in thrillers like this, not to go into a certain room, not to go to an assured place, but knowing that the actors always will.

The screenplay makes this an excellent movie and even though you’ve probably guessed the ending seconds after it started, there is a twist which brings fresh relief.

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