Review of Knock Knock (2015) by Tiny T — 22 Dec 2016

**Note: I find it difficult to discuss this movie without giving away important plot points. While I don't really delve into anything more than you'll see in the film's trailers (or read about in any other reviews), consider this your spoiler warning.**.

I don't know quite what to make of this one. Eli Roth's "Knock Knock" is part horror movie, part cautionary tale, part morality fable, part satire, part steamy erotica, part campy melodrama...the movie's all over the map, so I guess it shouldn't be much of a surprise that my reactions to it were as well.

Is it scary? Not really. Is it funny? There are a few moments of black humor that mostly work. Is it tense and riveting? On occasion. Is it strange? Most definitely. Is it an enjoyable movie experience? No, but that doesn't make it bad. Is it ultimately worth seeing? Not especially. It's not without merit, but I'm not exactly certain who the target audience is, and as a result, I don't think anybody will really take anything of value from the film.

Keanu Reeves stars as Evan, a successful architect who has his modern, luxurious home to himself for the weekend. His wife (Ignacia Allamand) and two young children have left for their beach house, allowing Evan to catch up on some overdue work. The first night alone, during a nasty rainstorm, there's a knock at the door. Evan finds two soaking wet young women (Lorenza Izzo and Ana de Armas) on his doorstep, looking for directions. It's pretty evident from the get-go that these sultry vixens are trouble, but Evan offers his assistance because (a) he's nice, and (b) he's a man. Yes, they appear to be women in need of help, but there's no denying they're also drop-dead gorgeous (not to mention, soaked from head to toe). I get the feeling his reaction might've been a bit different had it been two young men at his door...

This is the best stretch of the movie, as it quickly becomes clear the women have more in mind than simply using the phone to call an Uber. Reeves is very good here; I've criticized him often in the past for being too stiff and wooden, but here it works incredibly well as the devoted family man awkwardly deflects the girls' increasingly aggressive advances. Evan is sorely tempted, but it's clear he loves his family and has every intention of remaining faithful to his absent wife. But eventually the young seductresses find themselves in nothing but bathrobes...and then, well...the inevitable happens...

And then things change...and Evan is about to rue the moment he first heard those fateful knocks...

There are echoes of David Slade's audacious debut "Hard Candy" here, but the situation isn't quite the same. In that viciously effective film, Patrick Wilson's character was a straight-up scumbag, and that cast his would-be victim (Ellen Page) in a far more righteous light right off the bat, even though she clearly had issues of her own. Conversely, in "Knock Knock," Evan is an inherently decent person and although he undoubtedly does the wrong thing, the punishment doesn't alway seem to fit the scope of the crime. (For instance, it doesn't really make much sense for his wife and children to pay for his mistakes.).

And that's the main problem with "Knock Knock." What exactly is the point that Roth and the filmmakers are trying to make here? That a good man will always fold under pressure? That there is no fighting temptation?

Or is it something more sinister? Watching the film, I got the sense that, although it does not condone Evan's actions, it still inherently wants us to "root" for him. The women come off as sadistic and more than a bit deranged. Some of that is performance-based, as Lorenza Izzo and Ana de Armas are cartoonishly over the top throughout the whole second half of the movie. (Reeves' performance also dips considerably as Evan gets ever more hysterical. Reeves has never been all that great with histrionics, and it's at about this time that you realize why an actor like Nicolas Cage so often goes over the top: because he can.).

But more of it lies in the writing. Who's really being shamed here? Too often it seems more like the women's increasingly hostile actions speak more to their unstable nature than to Evan's transgressions. However noble their intentions may be, and I'd even say that's questionable, they're too unhinged to be likable.

It's possible I'm reading too much into this. There's just as much camp in "Knock Knock" as there is any of the other elements I mentioned above, so there's really no sense in taking any of it too seriously. But I see this as just another example of a film attempting to do too much. Had the film only set out to be exploitative trash, a la "Grindhouse" or much of the rest of Roth's filmography, that'd be one thing. But I think "Knock Knock" set its sights a little higher and just couldn't reach those heights.

As I said above, this is a strange, often problematic film, and I don't know what to make of it. Unfortunately, nothing about it really warrants a second viewing to try and clarify my thoughts.