It takes a good half-hour of Liv Tyler and Scott Speedman moping around and listening to Joanna Newsom on vinyl, but once it gets going, The Strangers offers a pretty suspenseful section of 45 minutes I wouldn’t want to watch in the dark while home alone late at night. The final 15, however — let’s just say debuting writer/director Bryan Bertino never should have let his story see the literal light of day.
Tyler and Speedman play a couple who, following a wedding reception at which she turned him down on his proposal, retreat all weepy to his dad’s vacation home for the night. Soon after drowning their individual sorrows in rusty bathwater and Blue Bell ice cream, there’s a knock at the door at an ungodly hour, with a young blonde asking for someone who isn’t there.
The inconvenience is merely step one of a trio’s ace home-invasion plan. This assault on precinct pretty-boy is made unnerving because the three perpetrators each sport a different mask; according to the credits, their names are Dollface, Pin-up Girl and Man in the Mask. That latter moniker doesn’t do him justice, as he wears a burlap sack with eyeholes and a painted smile. (Pin-up Girl’s facial disguise is particularly creepy; just ask my kids since I was sent one with the review copy. Yes, I am a horrible parent, but I cannot resist a laugh at their piss-their-pants expense.)
If illogical — they seemingly vanish via teleportation — their reign of terror is effective, like Michael Myers’ pursuit of Jamie Lee Curtis in the closet drawn out to feature length. The Strangers is neither brilliant nor groundbreaking, but works for more than half the time, which makes it worthy viewing. Reportedly based on true events, Bertino’s version is a tad better than the 2006 French film Them, which is so similar, I can’t see how The Strangers gets away without being credited as a remake. —Rod Lott