REVIEW: ‘Strangers’ sequel is solid horror film
The Strangers: Prey at Night will not win over new fans to the horror genre, but diehards who love things that go bump in the night will find plenty of thrills. The sequel to the sleeper hit of 2008 features scares and intensity, two necessary ingredients in a crowded horror marketplace.
This time around, Liv Tyler and Scott Speedman are jettisoned for Christina Hendricks (Mad Men) and Martin Henderson (Grey’s Anatomy), a married couple with two distant teenage children, Kinsey (Bailee Madison) and Luke (Lewis Pullman).
The four family members have been struggling recently, mostly with Kinsey and her schooling. To shake things up, they have decided to ship Kinsey away to boarding school, and the movie opens with them headed out for the big move.
Along the way, they make arrangements to stay a night at an uncle’s trailer at a summer camp in the woods. This is a horror movie, after all.
While trying to act pleasantly amongst one another, like good families are supposed to do, the hellish havoc begins. Three strangers, all wearing masks of some variety, begin to terrorize the family. They knock on the front door of the trailer in the middle of the night, brandish sharp knives, drive trucks at menacing speeds and pop up out of nowhere.
These three baddies are the only holdover from the 2008 film. Like the original movie, The Strangers: Prey at Night doesn’t add any mythology, backstories or context about the killers. This is simply a bad, violent night.
Some will decry the movie for its violence, and others will not see the point of 85 minutes of screaming and terrorizing. True. But as an exercise in cinematic intensity, The Strangers: Prey at Night succeeds. The tension is taut, and the escape games that the family members must play are intricate and seemingly based in reality. Do they make mistakes? Absolutely. But there’s a real sense of wanting to see the family succeed and get away from these horrible masked people.
The Strangers: Prey at Night is bloody and gory, but it’s also a scary good time.
By John Soltes / Publisher / John@HollywoodSoapbox.com
The Strangers: Prey at Night (2018), written by Ben Ketai and directed by Johannes Roberts, stars Christina Hendricks, Martin Henderson, Bailee Madison and Lewis Pullman. Running time: 85 minutes. Rated R for horror violence and terror throughout, and for language. Rating: 
