‘It Comes At Night’ is A24’s Scariest Movie
Your longstanding assessment of a movie is undoubtedly influenced by the environment in which you first watched it. I had to see Insidious: Chapter 3 thrice in theaters because, each time, there was something that disrupted the screening. The first time, a bunch of teens got into a fistfight. That third time, when I finally got to see the movie completely undisrupted, it just didn’t work for me. It’s why I’m an Insidious: The Last Key stan. That first-time watch is why nostalgia remains a heckuva drug, and perhaps more importantly, it’s why a movie’s marketing plays such a pivotal role in setting those original audience expectations.
Back when A24 was in its horror infancy, it’s fair to argue they struggled with that last point some. Every movie they released came with all the sensational pull quotes most movies could only dream of, and they never stopped at just scary. Every release was the scariest of all time, even if audiences were left wondering how three different movies released in the same calendar year could all be the scariest ever. Marketing can augment expectations, but it can also sully a first-time watch. A24’s It Comes at Night might be the most infamous of their horror bunch.
Watching It Comes At Night For The First Time
I first caught It Comes At Night months after it was released. I was alone in my room, streaming it on Netflix as a storm raged on outside. Hurricane Irma, one of the strongest storms on record in the Atlantic basin, had just arrived, and having had several years of hurricanes under my belt, I figured I had a good 12 hours or so of power left. Lit only by my computer screen in the middle of the night, It Comes At Night terrified me in a way I hadn’t been in a long time. It was a nebulous kind of fear, almost existential, this general, overarching sense that things weren’t right, even after the credits rolled.
It Comes At Night’s trailer was cut to perfection. Discordant music enmeshed with fragmented glimpses of a family on edge, the looming threat of something just beyond their doors in the dark of the night, waiting to break in. I was removed enough from the trailer to not remember much, but those who saw It Comes At Night opening weekend probably remembered it better than I did, and that’s probably why one of A24’s scariest movies earned a D CinemaScore, one of the production company’s lowest ever. For reference, The Witch was released two years prior and managed a C- on the same scale.
But How Do Others Feel About The Film?
Several months ago, I spotlighted It Comes At Night when it climbed the Max streaming charts. The reader reaction was less than kind. Seven years out, audiences remain frustrated with what is It Comes At Night’s greatest strength and most frustrating dupe: it is not a monster movie. Nothing conventionally beastly comes at night. It’s The Walking Dead’s ethos made cinematic—the real threat was other humans all along.
That isn’t Trey Edward Shults’ fault. It Comes At Night is quietly one of A24’s masterpieces. In a contemporary world marred by a pandemic, it’s considerably more chilling. Audiences, however, were reasonably led to believe one thing and then served another. The trailer, in fairness, does swagger with the confidence of a monster movie. The final shot is of a door bursting open, indicative of whatever unseen threat is living in the woods breaking in.
Audiences were pumped. A survivalist family and a group of strangers navigating mistrust and deception while a larger, more monstrous threat loomed just outside their doors. Yet, for the entirety of its runtime, audiences are never clued into whether there is some larger, corporeal threat outdoors. It Comes At Night remains committed to not just disease, but other humans, as the scariest threat of all.
So What Really Happens At The End Of It Comes At Night?
Granted, some fan theories argue differently. Assessing only what’s seen, it’s fair to assume there is no monster. Some fans, however, have contended that there maybe was, accounting for Travis’ (Kelvin Harrison Jr.) fear in the woods and undecipherably frightening dreams, omens of something terrible to come. There’s also the family dog, Stanley, which barks wildly at something beyond the door, only to escape and reappear torn to shreds. Other humans? Illness? A monster? Shults suggests the former two, though he never explicitly discounts the latter.
It’s why It Comes At Night, beholden to that age-old adage that what isn’t seen is scarier than what is, endures, at least for me, several years out. Whatever clean sketch Shults could have given me of the full scope of the threat in his ambiguously ravaged world would, no doubt, have been less scary than what I could conjure myself. Knowing something, anything, is outside your door at night is terrifying. Opening it and seeing what that thing is would be decidedly less so.
Years later, I remain steadfast in my assessment It Comes At Night is one of A24’s scariest movies. Even upon repeat viewings, it holds up. At the same time, I recognize the marketing and even the title itself led a lot of viewers astray. I’ve recommended it dozens of times and I’m not sure anyone has liked it quite as much as I have. Still, if you haven’t seen it yet, set all expectations aside—even those I set here—and check it out for yourself. It’s presently streaming on Max. There might be something on the other side of the door worth seeing.
Categorized:Editorials
