Don't Breathe Movie Review – Think Twice Before Robbing Someone

Runtime: 88 minutes

Release Date: August 26, 2016

Rating: R

Director: Fede Alvarez

Rocky wants nothing more than to escape the horrors of Detroit and take her little sister to California. As someone with no job and no real goals though, that's pretty hard to do. Luckily, she has her friends Alex and Money. Alex's dad owns a security system, and they steal from some of those clients and fence the goods to make extra cash. When the buyer starts offering them less than they think they deserve, they decide to do one last major haul.

Norman, referred to as the Blind Man, is a veteran and a widow. He lost his daughter after a woman accidentally killed her in a car accident. The Blind Man received a settlement of $300,000 that he supposedly keeps in his house and never uses. With Alex's tech devices, they think they can get in, grab the money, and get out before the old man ever notices they're inside.

Things almost instantly go wrong. Not only does the Blind Man have almost supernatural hearing, but he manages to kill – or nearly kill – one of the three within a few minutes of them entering his house. The other two soldier on in the hopes of finding money only to discover that he kidnapped the woman responsible for his daughter's death and keeps her locked in his basement. When he flips off the power to the house, the two “heroes” must find a way to compete with the Blind Man on his own turf.

Don't Breathe suffers from the same fate as any horror film released during a poor or boring season. It gets such great reviews off the bat that unless you see it within weeks of its opening, there's almost no point in ever seeing it. The hype builds up so much that you expect it to be the best horror film ever. The same thing happened with Insidious and with the more recent It Follows.

The film does have some terrifying moments and some disgusting moments too. When you learn why the Blind Man captured the woman and what he plans to do with Rocky, anyone with a vagina is the audience will wince and maybe even whimper. The scenes set in the basement and other parts of the house when the lights go out are also a little disturbing because you cannot necessarily see the action and because you have no way of knowing what might come next.

My problem might be that Rocky reminds me a little too much of those stereotypical kids that come from a bad home. Though she wants to change her life, she only wants to take the easy way out. Instead of maybe moving away from Detroit with her sister and getting a job, she just wants to rob people and save up the cash to move. Alex isn't any better. His dad seemingly has one of the only good jobs left in the city, but he's perfectly willing to steal from his dad's clients and maybe even ruin his business to help himself.

Worried that maybe I built up Don't Breathe too much in my head, I looked at my boyfriend at the end to get his opinion. “That was weird, not bad, but kind of weird and not that great.” As someone who frequently says similar things about flicks with a budget the size of a high school musical, that's not exactly high praise...