The Purge:
In the near future (less than ten years from now, in fact), America has gone over several major changes. The economy is now in it's best shape in years, crime and job-loss rates are at an all-time low, and the "New Founding Fathers" have fixed nearly every problem. One catch: Every year, on one night, for 12 straight hours, all crime, including murder, torture, rape, arson, robbery, and assault, is legal. The event is called "The Annual Purge". On that night, The Sandins, a wealthy family who live in a nice suburban neighborhood, put their home on lockdown and plan to spend the night relaxing. Later that night, a homeless black veteran comes to the neighborhood, wounded, begging for help. The Sandins' young son lets him in and quickly the night turns hellish. A group of wealthy, young sociopaths in creepy masks show up at their doorstep, taunting the Sandins, requesting they deliver the black veteran (who they selected as their target for the purging) to them within the hour, or they will break into their home, and kill the veteran and their entire family. Eventually deciding to fight back, the Sandins must survive the night and fight off the psychotic rich kids. Now, I was initially quite excited for this movie, but after several Internet critics and even the top critics started giving this film mixed reception, my hopes died down. The film's cast includes Ethan Hawke (Training Day, Gattaca, Sinister, Before Midnight, Dead Poets Society, Before the Devil Knows You're Dead, Alive) and Lena Headey (Game of Thrones, Dredd) as Mr. and Mrs. Sandin, the head of the household. They, along with Edwin Hodge (a lesser-known actor, who portrays the homeless veteran) are the stand-outs of the film. Despite being talented actors, they don't really have a lot to work with, so they're just sort of okay. That's the whole problem with the film: nothing to work with. Despite the promos, there's not much "purging" in the film until near the end, and most of it is inside a dark house. Unlike last year's Sinister, which was from the same producers and also starred Ethan Hawke (who is doing a lot more thriller/horror work now), it's somewhat boring and disappointing. There are some genuinely creepy moments, and the Sandins fighting off the freakish intruders is pretty awesome and entertaining, but overall the film is somewhat mediocre. A plot thread involving the teenage daughter's older boyfriend is forgotten about a half-hour into the film. Speaking of the daughter, Adelaide Kane and her younger co-star Max Burkholder (who portrays her younger brother) do a good job playing the kids, but again, not much to work with. Rhys Wakefield (a young actor who had a major role on Home and Away, as well as appearing in Broken Hill and Sanctum) turns in a hammy and over-blown performance as the "Polite Stranger", the leader of the psychotic pack of killers. His opening speech about purging is so forced and silly it ceases to be creepy and becomes laughable. He also has spouts of stupid giggling and smirking when trying to be creepy, in fact, he tries too hard to be creepy. I feel like that's not his fault, as the filmmakers wrote the character poorly to begin with. There is one or two moments when he comes off as creepy and unsettling. Another thing that's bad about the film is the over-use of the phrase "Cleanse your souls" and another phrase "Release the Beast", or even "Let us Purge". They are used so often it becomes funny. Another thing that The Purge does wrong is the satire. The satire is obvious from the trailer, a mockery of America's obsession with violence, but the film hammers in the satire of wealthy Americans and violence too much, but something the film does well is it does restrain on the violence, unlike other films that satire violence that becomes extremely violent themselves. Still with the negative, the film also never really goes into the day-to-day lives of the Sandins too much, and never goes into depth about the world of the film or why this Purge was even invented and it barely scratches the surface on why the public accepts it so much. I honestly don't believe in less than 10 years legal murder will be widely accepted, and that people would actually enjoy it. They never go into question such as: What if somebody needs medical assistance on the purge, are they screwed? What about psychopaths like the villains, do they keep their evil urges bottled up all year? That's seems hard to believe someone with the compulsive need to kill would bottle it up for 364 days. Although the film seems action-packed and thrilling, there's not too much going on until the last 20 minutes. One problems that's more of a problem with the theater I was in: no trailer for Insidious Chapter 2? Come on, now! (That's just a personal complaint and nit-pick.) The film is also a bit too short, whereas Insidious and Sinister felt like they really told a story and took their time, this feels too rushed. The film also takes an odd turn in it's final minutes, and the ending "moral" decision was somewhat stupid. The film was produced by Jason Blum (producer of such hits as Paranormal Activity, Insidious, and Sinister, who has milked the "horror house" concept dry) and Michael Bay (known for action films such as The Rock, Transformers, Armageddon, and Bad Boys). Blum used his company Blumhouse Productions, and Bay used his infamous Platinum Dunes production company, which is known for either making decent remakes of slasher films (Texas Chainsaw Massacre, Friday the 13th) or make franchise-ruining nightmares (Texas Chainsaw Massacre: The Beginning). This was a decent movie, but it wasn't attached to another franchise. Another thing: the technology ten years form now is something you'd expect maybe 20-25 years from now. I didn't care for this film too much, and I'm hoping After Earth isn't as big a disappointment despite the critical backlash. The Purge is a decent futuristic horror-thriller, but the trailer is more entertaining than most of the movie (except for the short home invasion segment) and the acting is either okay or too over-blown, and there's not much action. 2.5/5 stars.
(Spoilers Below Posters)
Links:
Jeremy Jahns' short video review: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nE0vyLM7rlM
Mathew Buck's longer video review: http://blip.tv/film-brain/projector-the-purge-6597638
IGN.com written review: http://www.ign.com/articles/2013/05/30/the-purge-review
(Images: Wikipedia, moviepilot.com, Bloody-Disgusting.com)(SPOILERS) During the ending scuffle, Ethan Hawke is killed by Wakefield. My instant thought was: poor Mr. Hawke, always in horror-thrillers, you're killed. It's also always caused by your kids. Here: your dumb kid let a guy into the house, people busted in, now you're dead. In Sinister: daughter is possessed by Bughuul, murders you and her family with an axe, is taken into another realm by Bughuul. Oh, and at the end of the film, nothing changes. The Purge is still legal, everyone still accepts it, it's still a fucked-up system. (SPOILERS)
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