Spoilers will be warbling.
This was good, and completely unexpected. That was a godsend, as without a compass I was drawn and invested in where the movie would go. Now, it’s a given that with the sci-fi genre attached, we’re going to meet a few folk from out of town and with the horror flag we already know they’re unfriendly. I am glad to say that even with those two aspects revealed off the bat I was invested thanks to a strong performance and nice production.
No One Will Save You (2023) is written and directed by Brian Duffield. Brynn (Kaitlin Dever) is a young woman that has isolated herself from the small town community she lives in due to past events. We get hints here and there that this is due to some past trauma that alienated her from her peers. Noises wake her up one night as unexplained phenomena messes up with her lights and messes up her home until she goes downstairs and sees the shape of something unnatural skittering in her living room.
If you’ve been here before, you know that I prefer any supernaturality hidden and ambiguous until the big reveal, but in this case it’s not long until it becomes obvious we’re dealing with outworldlies of the unfriendly kind. I thought this early in the game that reveal was a mistake, but it’s not. It becomes evident to Brynn and to us that the invaders she’s up against outmatch her. She’s been holed up in her home, she’s not secretly a gun collector (or lives next to one or any recourse by which she’s going to turn into Ripley) and she’s not particularly strong either. Or is she?
The best surprise of the film is how resilient our protagonist can be. Brynn genuinely embodies the best strong female character of all – the incidental and accidental one. She’s scared out of her mind but when cornered she’s going to prove resourceful in the extreme. Using her environment, her wits or by sheer determination she takes advantage of any hesitation or window of opportunity to escape. Kaitlin Dever shines in her physical performance as the unlikely final girl. Now, I could nitpick about some of the choices. There are few moments in which Brynn’s foe has her dead to rights and hesitates or pauses for no obvious reason, but I can’t deny it keeps the tension up when it has to.
It works. The story itself is rather basic. Brynn is just trying to make it out alive. The thrill is seeing her resist and still manage to slip by every other encounter. In some way it’s a roller coaster ride as she It’s taking a toll on her mind and body, and it shows. The non-terrestrial antagonist physique is of course CGI, but the production grounds it by solid sound design and environment interaction. You’re hoping she finds someone that will help her but the title fits the premise. The ending has aspects that will leave a lot to interpretation. After the frantic pursuit some audiences will find it anticlimactic, but I’d rather have that than a cheap cliffhanger.
Highly recommended. I have minor reservations and there’s minor flaws, but I can’t blame that overall it’s a very well built thriller with enough scares and tension to carry out throughout the runtime. The ending is ambiguous. Unlike other horror films it does reveal layers for its lead and develop the character to a resolution that is more mental than logical. It does leave some particular aspects open-ended that might be debatable for audiences. Kaitlin Dever’s performance is brilliant as anxious, tense and determined without being over-confident. Very much worth a watch.
That will do for now.
Never Think Impossible 