AndyDursin wrote: ↑Wed May 19, 2021 12:02 am When no movie exists in a self-contained world, they can just keep making "episodes" -- the movie doesn't actually end because the series doesn't end. It just keeps making a new entry every 6-12 months.

Maybe they should go back to what they did with the early Bond pictures -- making one each year!

I'll do my part for the movie theater comeback at some point but personally I'm going to wait for this to show up in 6 weeks on Paramount+. Too many reviews say it's good but familiar retread territory. I don't feel like plunking down additional coin for reserve seats for that, which I believe the nearest Showcase to me is still doing.

If it's a fresh new movie going experience, I'll consider going, but sequels and retreads haven't motivated me to go back to the movies -- even before COVID.

I just don't feel like spending excess money on experiences I've already had before.

You're killing movie theaters by staying home.

Again, make more exciting movies -- make some new experiences. This has less to do with COVID than I simply don't feel that compelled to see it right away. It's just my decision as a consumer. It's like $13 plus another $4 for the "online ticketing convenience fee", plus a 20 minute drive each way, for an experience it sounds like (as good as I'm sure it is) that I've already had as a viewer. I can wait 45 days for that.

8.5/10

While this doesn't really "add" much to the experience of the first, it thankfully also doesn't do the typical "Bigger = Better" sequel thing by bloating out with a series of repetitive action sequences. Krasinski's skill in cross-cutting various setpieces works like gangbusters in ratcheting up the tension. I also appreciate that it's only about seven minutes longer than the first...there would be NO reason to push this to a two-hour runtime other than "The first made money, so now I have the clout to keep everything in". It's taut, exciting, and satisfyingly emotional, a worthy continuation of the first. Only minor flaws are that Blunt's kids look like they aged two years overnight (especially Noah Jupe), and that her "newborn" infant aged about nine months. :p Other than that, this is one of the best "unnecessary" sequels to an unexpected horror box office smash I can think of, and everyone involved should be proud of not succumbing to Sophomore Slump and producing something as well-made as this.

$57 million opening.

https://deadline.com/2021/05/a-quiet-pl ... 234766021/

AndyDursin wrote: ↑Thu May 27, 2021 12:45 pm Again, make more exciting movies -- make some new experiences.

Give me a big epic with a cast of great actors and top-tier writer and director -- with a score by someone like John Williams (or at least a composer who can write bold, memorable themes and orchestrate) -- then I'll go to a movie.

But I'm not paying $10+ to see a low-budget indie. My TV is good enough for movies with TV-level production value.

7/10

This is a weird sequel to review because it's well executed and thoughtfully written -- just as the first film was -- but the fact it's so similar to the original is also part of its ultimate problem. Overall I didn't feel there was enough "new" in this movie -- the formula is the same, the dramatic beats are the same, yet we know everything there is to know about the aliens so the freshness is just gone and the individual set-pieces, by the end, feel a little tired. (Ironically the one moment in this sequel where you DO find out something new about the creatures isn't as forcefully conveyed as it should've been).

The movie still looks great, the characters remain compelling, and John Krasinski does a good job cross-cutting action scenes late in the movie -- but I wanted more of that, and less of the same "creature encounters" we've seen before. What's worse, the wider story doesn't advance much at all, and the fact it's still 93 minutes means it just ends, albeit on a moment that's not nearly as emotionally charged here.

I also felt there was too much of "kids in jeopardy" constantly in this film -- the baby, the daughter, the surviving son, it's a movie that seems to get its kicks out of placing these children solely in peril which felt a little distasteful after a while. Yes there's plenty of that in the first one, but this one doesn't veer off that at all, and doesn't match its predecessor's emotional range -- it's more interested in the repetitive encounters with the creatures and how they overcome them, yet we've been down the road already, we've already been exposed to this world, so it just doesn't have the same impact.

Overall I think the concept has reached its end point with this sequel -- in so far as a 90 minute movie with limited dialogue goes. Yet if you expand the movie out to 2 hours and craft a wider-spanning story, it likely becomes just another alien invasion movie, because frankly, now that we've seen the creatures, they aren't that compelling by themselves. It's a "Place" Paramount will have to grapple with in order to keep this surprisingly lucrative, unlikely franchise going.