The Strangers begins with that clichéd caption about being “inspired by true events.” Don’t waste too much time pondering this; my guess is that the events that “inspired” this movie are about as tenuous as Wisconsin’s Ed Gein having inspired The Texas Chainsaw Massacre. Really, any movie about serial killers could make this claim. It’s either a way for the producers to offer a rationale for making such a film, or else it’s merely a narrative device aimed at drawing the audience in.
Another caption follows, informing us that there are “1.4 million violent incidents in America each year.” And that one reminded me of a similar caption at the beginning of the recent remake of The Hitcher, which noted that there are something like 42,000 fatalities on highways ever year. The point being what? The Hitcher’s really been busy?
What are we to make of this one? Wow, those serial killers must be all over the place. Since this figure undoubtedly includes bar fights and purse snatchings, I fail to see the significance—except, once again, an attempt to get under the audience’s skin before the film even starts rolling. “If violence happens that often, it could happen to me…” What the dubious statistic does not tell us is that, of those 1.4 million incidents, maybe one or two are in any way similar to the events in this film. But it wouldn’t sound as impressive or ominous to say a Manson-like cult family goes on a killing spree once every few years.
Okay, now that I’ve spent three paragraphs riffing on the opening cards, what about the movie? Actually, regarding the hour and a half that follows the opening titles, I can probably say all I have to say in another three paragraphs…
The first thirty minutes or so are pretty suspenseful. The director, cinematographer, and sound person together succeed in making the isolated summer home surrounded by thick woods into a spooky, tense place to be—especially when strange girls are showing up at four in the morning at the front door asking “Is Tamara home?” Followed, not too long after, by pounding. The front door itself becomes the most ominous place in this house: the portal of entry, violated by someone who has no business being here. I mention the sound specifically because sound is used to strong atmospheric effect. The only music is supplied by a scratchy record player, and the record collection consists mostly of spooky folk songs and old country music in a minor key. Diegetic sound (sound within the world of the film) is also effectively employed to up the palpable tension in the atmosphere: bangs, taps, the creaking of an old swing set. When the mysterious man with the sackcloth over his head begins popping up like a ghost, followed by his two female disciples in baby-doll masks, the film delivers some creepy chills.
Then, about the halfway mark, it takes a left turn into “I’ve-seen-this-all-before.” The last third of the film, in fact, is not very distinguishable from Wolf Creek or The Hills Have Eyes or any of the other in the recent spate of “killer-chasing-around-and-toying-with-helpless-victim” movies. I really lost interest when James Hoyt (Scott Speedman) gets hold of a shotgun and fills his pockets with shells. That’s where the movie should’ve been over. At a knife fight, he’s got a gun, but he does the predictably wrong thing with it (I won’t give a spoiler, but I saw it coming a mile away) and proves to be uselessly incompetent. It’s really not that the killers are preternaturally dangerous; it’s that their victims are bumbling mice, who seem to have been fated to do every wrong thing to assure their demise.
Which brings me to the protagonists. When we meet the unlucky couple, Kristen McKay (Liv Tyler) has just turned down Hoyt’s wedding proposal. She’s just not ready. She still wants to get it on, though (no sense wasting the romantic setting, complete with rose petals, candles, and champagne). Will it just be break-up sex? We’ll never know. In fact, we never learn anything more about them. Hoyt seems pretty broken up—“embarrassed”—about being turned down, and that’s as far as character development goes. Was it the filmmakers’ intent to make these two people blank ciphers so that we, the audience, could project ourselves into their places? This is supported by much of the camera work being from the protagonists’ POV, causing us to feel their hemmed-in, disorienting state. But it backfires. When Hoyt gets the gun, I, putting myself in his shoes, know that this turn of events should put an end to the shenanigans. The fact that it does not feels too contrived, and I lose whatever interest I had in these people. In other words: There’s no sense rooting for them anymore, because it’s not the circumstances they’re up against; it’s the script. You could give them a bazooka and night-vision goggles; it wouldn’t make any difference. They are the lambs for slaughter. It is their destiny.
For the record, a much better film with a similar premise is Vacancy. In that film, I got to know the couple, and I rooted for them, and they showed themselves to be resourceful and self-reliant, giving me even more reason to pull for them. They obviously wanted to live. The characters in Strangers were never alive. The film may have been “inspired by true events,” but the people we see on the screen were not inspired by anyone. Like the killers of the title, the protagonists to us remain strangers.
--Nicholas Ozment