1.5 stars out of 5

More frightening then the masked home invaders in this ’70s styled horror retread, is new director Bryan Bertino’s complete lack of self-cognizance. Unable to hold up the weight of its own horror-suspense banality, The Strangers is a nonsensical mess that inspires more laughter than fright. Featuring such spooky gems as starting off the film with a “based on a true story” (complete with a Dragnet narrative), isolated home local, writing on windows, phone play, an ax smash through the door and –the coup de grâce– a weak woman trips and hurts her leg while running away from the killer(s)! Picture Scream, Funny Games, and The Texas Chainsaw Massacre without the edge, self-awareness, and pompacity. (In the case of Funny Games, the audience will leave just as violated but for completely different reasons.)

Arriving for a would-be romantic weekend at his childhood home, James Hoyt (Scott Speedman) and his girlfriend Kristen (Liv Tyler) were intending to enjoy a romantic weekend alone. Both, not in the best of moods due to a rejected marriage proposal, find themselves in the awkward situation of a newly deceased relationship in a house in the middle of nowhere. Just when the formerly happy couple are literally on the verge of reconciliation, a 3 am knock on the door startles our twosome. “Is Tamra there?” asks the teenish girl. Barely making out the girls face, she’s informed she has the wrong house, another awkward silence, and she bids James and Kristen adieu. Later, as James decides to venture into town to grab some cigarettes, Kristen is left to more knocks on the door, a power outage, and window scrawling in lip stick. Insert suspense here. Terrified, she runs around the house telling her tormentors to go away (which they rarely do) and grabs her cell phone to call her now deeply depressed boyfriend. Upon his return back to the homestead, the boyfriend acts as any clinched horror boyfriend would do when hearing tales of door knocking and scribbles on windows from a panicky woman. In disbelief. Soon, James picks up the pace and they are both forced into the proverbial game of cat and mouse (or masked murderers and an isolated  yuppyish white couple). Forced into the nearby forest, our duo tries in vain to escape only to find their vehicle trashed and newly destroyed by the masked group’s pick-up truck.

The Strangers is strange not because of any supposed fright tactics or tired plot devices but by giving away any suspenseful ending by flatly telling the audience that, and I’m not giving any secrets away but telling you this, our two protagonists do not make it out of this film alive. No chance of any emotional attachment can be created let alone held when we learn that the two 20-somethings we’re watching for over an hour, are eventually killed by their assailants. It’s pointless and sadly cumbersome to watch a film that rehashes stale horror formulas while, all the while, giving away any semblance of hope. Like a shiny nickel under the soiled couch, Scott Speedman and Liv Tyler’s respective performances are solid, though not much meat is assigned to them. The blame, if one cares enough to assign it, lies squarely on writer/director Bryan Bertino. Though able to achieve some fantastic ambiance and mood through his use of light and shadow play, the movie just does not pick up well after the opening credits. There is some raw talent here and it poked through the many holes in the movie. To borrow from another over-used cliche, Bertino will need to bring a can of creative whoop-ass in his next effort.