The Guest (2014)

It's probable that I may have heard of this film before but I didn't really become 'aware' of what it was until I saw an interview with its writer Simon Barrett on Red Letter Media's YouTube channel. I watch a lot of movie related discussion on YouTube, but seldom does it prompt me to go out of my way to see a movie, especially a movie that I was essentially a blank on until I saw said video. The Guest is a kind of suspense/thriller/action film, it's also sort of a horror movie, and maybe sci-fi depending on how you interpret some things in it. Interestingly the film starts kind of like one of those overly earnest Iraq War fatigue films of the George W. Bush era, but this movie switches up its apparent genera a number of times, yet remains coherent while doing so, which can be a tough thing to pull off. The Guest is a throw back in a number of ways, lite homage to early John Carpenter in its slow build and use of Carpenters preferred fount for the title.

The plot concerns David Collins (Dan Stevens), a army vet who travels to small town New Mexico to visit the family of an army buddy who died, apparently in combat but the particulars aren't really made clear. The Peterson family is won over by David pretty quick, and he agrees to stay with them for a few days, during which time his behavior gets increasingly odd and its very apparent that he's hiding something, but what? I won't say much more about the story because it should be fun to be taken by surprise, and this film has a few of those. Solid, enjoyable, unique, for me at least this will warrant a repeat viewing. The cast is principally lesser known, and while the movie was made for only around $5 million, it does a good job of stretching that money. I didn't really know who Dan Stevens was going into this but since I saw the movie last week it seems like he's just jumped up in everything, I keep seeing him and reading his name, he's pretty good, and not yet type cast. The Guest can at times be a little intense so its not for all audiences, but if your comfortable with violence and an R rating I'd recommend. ***