Knock at the Cabin

First there was the beach break from hell in Old, and now a countryside cabin is about to get a decidedly negative review on TripAdvisor – Knock at the Cabin is M Night Shyamalan’s second film in as many years to focus on a family whose idyllic escape is interrupted by an ominous outside threat.

While the carnage in Old was the result of both allegorical greed and a weird natural phenomenon, the threat here is something more mysterious, as a group of strangers proclaim the apocalypse is nigh and only the cabin’s unsuspecting inhabitants have the power to stop it.

Attempting to relax in rural Pittsburgh are husbands Eric (Jonathan Groff) and Andrew (Ben Aldridge) along with their young daughter Wen (Kristen Chui). While collecting grasshoppers in the overgrown field outside the cabin, Wen is approached by Leonard (Dave Bautista), a meek but imposing stranger who asks if the pair can be friends. Despite her initial scepticism, Wen warms to Leonard after he demonstrates his own grasshopper-catching skills. All the while, a group of other figures loom from the tree line, and it becomes clear that something odd is going on.

Leonard and his associates Redmond (Rupert Grint), Sabrina (Nikki Amuka-Bird) and Adriane (Abby Quinn) are armed with peculiar, severe-looking weapons, and inform the family that they have to make an impossible choice in order to prevent the forthcoming apocalypse: they must willingly sacrifice one of their own. Eric and Andrew are understandably sceptical, assuming Leonard and co to be a band of wandering psychopaths. Though tension mounts as the group become increasingly frenetic and evidence builds that there might be some truth to this bizarre claim.

The twin themes of family and sacrifice have recurred throughout Shymalan’s films, and Knock at the Cabin – while an adaptation of Paul G Tremblay’s ​‘The Cabin at the End of the World’ rather than a totally original story – fits in nicely to his oeuvre. There’s a sense he cares deeply about his characters, never wishing to inflict unnecessary pain and suffering upon them, which is no mean feat in a horror film.

Shyamalan achieves this by conveying a sense of deep urgency, which gives the decision at the film’s core a real sense of grave importance, and his rather radical alterations to the third act of Tremblay’s text actually work well within the context of the story he’s has decided to tell.

Shyamalan’s an optimist, see, despite what the macabre tone of so much of his work would have you believe. Films like The Sixth Sense, The Village and even Split are imbued with a belief in human connection and strength. In Knock at the Cabin, it’s impressive how much character development the filmmaker packs into a 100-minute runtime, particularly given there are eight players in the cast. As always he’s skilled at picking his actors, with Bautista demonstrating a soft intensity that feels quite different from his past work, while young newcomer Chui a total natural in front of the camera.

If there is one major issue with Knock at the Cabin’s execution, it’s that the story does feel a little rushed – the action supposedly takes place over a couple of days, but we don’t gain much insight into the evenings, and it’s a little difficult to believe that a family being held captive would obediently sleep through the night without attempting to break free. But there’s still a great deal to admire, in particular the rich cinematography of Jarin Blaschke (best known for his collaborations with Robert Eggers) which creates a pleasing contrast from the sinister scenario, and the affection with which Shyamalan treats all his characters. Sure, there’s violence, but there’s a whole lot of love too.