Review: A Quiet Place a superb thriller you should see with as little advance knowledge as possible

THE wrong advance knowledge about A Quiet Place can crush its chances of shocking, surprising and subverting the expectations of viewers — so this spoiler-free review is vague for good reason.

THE wrong advance knowledge about A Quiet Place can crush its chances of shocking, surprising and subverting the expectations of viewers.

So if this review seems too coded or vague in any way, it is for good reason.

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Should you experience A Quiet Place with nothing more than your guard down, eyes up and ears open (trust me, this last condition is of the utmost importance), then you will have witnessed one of the most unforgettable and best movies of 2018.

The movie opens with a title card informing us it is ‘Day 89’. It is apparent some kind of catastrophic event has all but emptied the world as we know it.

John Krasinski leads a family under immense pressure just to stay alive.

Inside an abandoned general store, a family of survivors is quickly gathering provisions.

It is not the urgency with which the group is collecting food and medicine that gets your attention. It is their desperate determination to complete their mission without making a sound.

Any sonic activity beyond the faintest whisper has the father (John Krasinski) of the clan staring daggers at his wife (Emily Blunt) and three young children.

The nature of the threat they all face remains unknown at this point. However, the sustained intensity and finality of that threat feels all too real.

Another title card comes up on the screen. It is now ‘Day 472’. Remarkably, the family have struck upon an organisational alchemy that has allowed them to go on living almost normally amid such abnormal adversity.

Their eldest child (played by young hearing-impaired actor Millicent Simmonds) is deaf, so everyone can communicate easily via sign language.

Millicent Simmonds and John Krasinski in A Quiet Place.

Everyone gets around in bare feet, walking only on ground carefully layered with sand to muffle their steps.

The micromanagement even extends to mealtimes. No crisp food can be consumed. As for cutlery, forget about it.

How long can this all go on, you might well ask, when as much as a single cough can seal several fates?

An answer is not too far away, and we will begin to dread its arrival. The mother has fallen pregnant, and shall be giving birth in a matter of weeks. A baby cannot be trained to zip up. So how can the family prevent a terminal slip-up?

Emily Blunt in a scene from the nerve-shredding film.

The exacting construction of this seemingly simple premise — and the astonishing sound design holding it firmly in place — is as impressive as it is effective. The bulk of the plaudits must to Krasinski, not just for a fine performance (the entire small cast is brilliant) but also for his consummate control as director.

The end result is nerve-shredding, spellbinding and compellingly impossible to turn away from.

You might be able to handle what you see in A Quiet Place, but what you hear will take some time to get over.

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A QUIET PLACE (M)

Rating: 4½ stars (out of 5)

Director: John Krasinski (The Hollars)

Starring: John Krasinski, Emily Blunt, Millicent Simmonds, Noah Jupe.

For whom the decibel tolls