Speak No Evil
Cinépolis Luxury Cinemas
West Hartford
Speak No Evil is a psychological horror movie that follows the Dalton family on a trip to Italy, where they meet Paddy and Ciara, a young, fun couple that invites them out to their home in the rural part of the country. Once they’re alone with Paddy, Ciara and their young son Ant, the Daltons quickly discover that something is not right.
James McAvoy is always a pleasure to watch as the off-center Paddy, a man who revels in novelty and excitement even if the activities are a little dangerous. McAvoy, best known for his turn as the heroic mutant Charles Xavier in the X‑Men franchise, gives Paddy an electric undercurrent of menace, even as he quickly endears himself to the Daltons through their daughter, Agnes.
The child actors do a great job as well. Alix West Lefler puts in an excellent performance as a daughter who is two steps ahead of her parents in realizing that Paddy and Ciara (Aisling Franciosi) are dangerous. That’s because of her friendship with their son, Ant, who is played with tragic nuance by Dan Hough. Indeed, Ant is as much of a victim as the Daltons. Despite some difficulties in communicating that I don’t want to give away, he manages to be the most intelligent and resourceful character in the movie.
Despite a promising yet somewhat predictable setup, Speak No Evil never lives up to the promise of its premise because of too much time spent talking instead of terrifying. The movie goes on for almost 80 minutes before the violent confrontation between the Daltons and Paddy kicks into gear. It seems that the film was going for a slow burn to ratchet up the tension, but that approach ultimately fails because it’s extremely difficult, if not impossible, to maintain that level of stress and anxiety for so long. Instead of building anticipation, after a while I found myself feeling bored, waiting for something to happen.
Another element that holds back the movie is that the Dalton parents, played by Mackenzie Davis and Scott McNairy, behave with a frustrating level of obtuseness that harms, rather than facilitates, the anxiety of the movie. The horror genre is often predicated on characters making inexplicably poor decisions, but many of the choices made by the Daltons deflate the sense of danger the movie spends too long trying to build. There are multiple, obvious signs that Paddy and Ciara are not the fun-loving couple they claim to be. In fact, there are so many signs that the Daltons actually leave in the middle of the night to escape them. They return to retrieve an important item for their daughter, and then decide to stay after being fed a buffet of lies.
A big part of what makes the “cabin in the woods” subgenre of horror work is the sense of claustrophobia, of being trapped in a hopeless situation. That feeling is obliterated when the victims can simply leave whenever they want, which the Daltons do not once, but twice, just to walk right back into danger.
The final battle between the families is exciting enough, but doesn’t do anything that we haven’t already seen in this genre of movie. Ultimately, the problem with Speak No Evil is that we don’t see any evil until the very end.
NEXT
Cinépolis Luxury Cinemas is open seven days a week.
Jamil goes to see the Haunting Titans at the Old State House.
