A Quiet Place: Day One

by Tyler Glover

Photo: Paramount Pictures

Director: Michael Sarnoski 
Starring: Lupita Nyong'o, Joseph Quinn & Alex Wolff 
Rated: PG-13 (terror and violent/bloody content)
Runtime: 1 hour & 39 minutes 

Ssshhhhhhhh! Do not let them hear you!

In the new horror sci-fi flick, “A Quiet Place: Day One,” you may want to be quiet to prevent yourself from dying. An attack by an extraterrestrial creature is guaranteed if you make noise, and you will face almost certain death ... but I can tell you one thing: I will not be quiet about how great this film is.
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This is the third entry into the wildly popular ‘Quiet Place’ series. It is both a spin-off and a prequel to its predecessors. Instead of following the Abbott family, we follow Samira, played by Academy Award-winning actress Lupita Nyong’o. She is facing the same alien invasion that takes place in the other films. That is one thing I find refreshing about this expansion of the universe. If an event like an alien invasion ever occurs, everyone in the world will be affected. Movies will show us how this affects a certain number of people, but by giving this story its own film, we are genuinely getting to see what that adventure is like for someone else facing the same invasion in a moment-by-moment way.

“A Quiet Place: Day One” follows Samira (Nyong’o), a young terminally ill cancer patient who has gone on a day trip to New York City to see a puppet show with other hospice patients. They are led by Reuben (Alex Wolff), a caretaker at the center, who tries to be encouraging to Samira despite her bleak circumstances. Samira is very excited to get to have pizza in the city. However, while leaving the show, extraterrestrial creatures invade the Earth. As mentioned above, they can hear every noise humans make. Samira, accompanied by her adorable cat named Frodo, has to figure out how she will survive. Samira eventually befriends Eric (Joseph Quinn), and they decide to help each other navigate these unprecedented circumstances.

The film’s screenplay is written by Michael Sarnoski and based on a story by John Krasinski and Sarnoski. The writing on these films is a key component to what makes them so special. When you see a disaster movie or apocalyptic movie, you almost always see major landmarks being overtaken. You might see a tidal wave over the Golden Gate Bridge, an ominous shadow overtaking the Statue of Liberty, or disaster striking the White House. Most films in this genre show the massive global repercussions of whatever event occurs. In these films, we are dealing with a disaster from the perspective we would face it in. We wouldn’t be able to flash over and spy on the President and his people and how they are handling it. We wouldn’t be getting intelligence from the CIA or FBI about where these aliens came from. We would be trying to survive. We would be dealing with little to no information about what is going on. That’s what this movie and this franchise has done so brilliantly. We are witnessing these events happen as they would for us in the real world, which makes it even more thrilling and horrifying.

The film also shows us these events from a different perspective. The first two films show how a parent would navigate this horror to protect themselves and their kids. How would you feel differently about these events if you were single and terminally ill from cancer? What do your priorities become in an event like this? How do they differ? What do you want to do with the rest of your time here on Earth? How does that differ with these new horrific circumstances? Lupita Nyong’o shows us why she won that Academy Award years ago for Best Picture winner, “12 Years A Slave.” Nyong’o’s performance shows us all that while she is a brilliant actress in general, she is one of the absolute best in the horror genre. In Jordan Peele’s “Us,” Nyong’o was this close to an Academy Award nomination for Best Actress. Lupita Nyong’o always delivers extraordinary performances and was perfectly cast in this film.

While I could continue to sing the praises of this film, I think I’ll be quiet now ... before they hear me.