Imagine if every sound you make brings you closer to your death. Every creak, every breath. Would you be able to survive? Would you want to survive?
In the modern horror thriller A Quiet Place (starring John Krasinski and Emily Blunt), a family of four must navigate their lives in silence after mysterious creatures that hunt by sound threatens their survival. If they hear you, they hunt you.
Horror movie fans have long known that hearing can scare you more deeply than seeing. A Quiet Place draws on the long innovative history of chilling films that cleverly use sound editing and music to architect atmosphere, to heighten confusion and sustain nearly unbearable suspense. But the idea was also to take the use of sound somewhere new, making the sound a character in and of itself. The sound in this film is an entity to be both feared and savored, down to the dialogue. The Abbotts may not be able to speak out loud to one another, but that makes everything they say that much more important.
The danger facing the Abbotts is intensified by the sheer scope of the threat. The creatures, about whom they know nothing, seem to be everywhere at once, surrounding and enveloping the Abbotts in non-stop peril. they can pop out at any moment, in any place, turning even the most ordinary activity onto a breathless task.
It is the way the creatures operate: their mystery, their pervasiveness, that creates such mounting anxiety throughout most of the film. They are not even seen distinctly until the climax of the film, amplifying how much the audience relates to the Abbotts’ anxiety around knowing so little of what is hunting them.
The reasons that the Abbotts have been able to survive a menace that has devastated much of the globe quickly become clear: their love for each other, their ability to stay close even in silence and perhaps most of all, their sheer resourcefulness. The Abbotts put every last bit of their know-how as farmers to constant use while trying to stay one step ahead of the mystery hunting them.
The Koalition had an opportunity to attend the press junket for Paramount Pictures’ A Quiet Place and interview cast and crew members: John Krasinski, Emily Blunt, Millicent Simmonds, Noah Jupe, Brad Fuller (Producer), Andrew Form (Producer), Bryan Woods (Screenwriter/Executive Producer) and Scott Beck (Screenwriter/Executive Producer).
