The following is a review of Hush, available on Netflix right now.
Hush follows Maddie Young (played by Kate Siegel), a deaf-mute woman who lives on her own in the woods, on a night where her worst fears are realized, when a masked man (played by John Gallagher, Jr.) wielding a crossbow shows up at her doorstep to terrorize her.
Now, normally I like to go over numerous performances, but there aren’t really a lot of people in this film, and there is only really one performance that stood out to me. John Gallagher Jr. is having a pretty great year. I loved Gallagher in The Newsroom (2012-2014), and I was so happy to see him in the great 10 Cloverfield Lane, which might actually be the film that really showcased his talent to the general moviegoing audience for the first time.
But Gallagher also does a really solid job in Hush. I don’t think that his character is all that special, but I liked seeing him in this kind of role after having seen him in 10 Cloverfield Lane some weeks ago, wherein he handled a very different character very well.
Now, I’ll get right to it. I really loved the premise of this film. There’s a really neat idea at the center of the story. Isolation isn’t something new to horror films, but the situation that our main character is put in feels very fresh, even if I am sure there are other films or shows that have used a similar premise.
And this film really had me for a while. It had some good scares, the premise worked for me, and I thought the filmmakers did a good job of showing how uneasy Maddie would feel. But the direction that they take the story in isn’t limitless. At some point during the cat-and-mouse game, which the masked man had started, the story just lost me.
Then, at least I thought, the film becomes terribly predictable. And, without saying too much, the film had set up this inner voice that Maddie had, and I really hated how they handled that later in the film.
So, overall, it was an uneven experience for me. I loved a lot of the first half of the film, but, eventually, I thought that the premise grew stale due to how they had chosen to handle the main character. However, I will say that I might’ve gone into this film with the wrong expectation level. I thought this film was going to be brilliant, but, in the end, it was just another okay horror film.
6.5 out of 10
– I’m Jeffrey Rex
I'm Jeffrey Rex 