“Hush” is brought to us by the same man who scared the dickens out of audiences with the 2013 horror film “Oculus;” Michael Flanagan. Flanagan directed and cowrote “Hush” with the film’s star Kate Siegel, who plays the deaf/mute heroine; author Maddie.
The writer has moved out in the middle of nowhere to work on her latest novel and after her neighbor Sarah (Samantha Sloyan) stops by for a visit to return a book, things start going very badly for the author. Her dinner is burnt to a crisp, setting off her smoke alarm and not long after Sarah leaves, the good neighbor/friend is murdered right outside Maddie’s house.
The murderer is a man (John Gallagher Jr.) wearing a while “plain” face mask that has a whimsical and sad smile on its visage. Learning that his next victim is deaf, the man begins a night -ong game of cat and mouse with Maddie. The madman is quite confident that he is going to win in the game and because of this he underestimate’s his victim and her capabilities.
Maddie is armed with a fertile imagination and a will to survive. She battles the crazy man with his crossbow and bests her foe a number of times. In the end whoever is the most focussed and able to plan ahead will win.
Flanagan uses Maddie’s world to good effect. The author can hear a voice in her head (it sounds, she says, like her mother) as she was not born deaf. This voice, along with her ability to see events in her head like a film, not only make her a capable writer, but a more than adequate enemy to the man who wants to kill her.
If there is one complaint about this film, it is the unexplained, or even addressed, motive of just why the man with the crossbow and knife is intent on killing the writer. The killer just turns up and murders the next door neighbor, he also takes out her husband later on, but only just.
Despite the randomness of the killer’s actions, the film works on different levels. The man is not a superhuman monster, a’la Jason or Michael Meyers. The murderer uses cunning and at least one victim’s gullibility to win.
The tension is pretty taut and gives the film a needed touch of suspense, taking away from the usual “slasher” premise. There are no jump-scares here. Having a deaf-mute heroine takes the film even further away from the “idiots being slaughtered by a knife wielding maniac” theme and helps make the action that bit more believable.
Set in the dark woods in a house that is Maddie’s combination of safe haven and prison, “Hush” is suspenseful and clever enough to keep the viewer on the edge of their seat. The lighting is perfect, giving the illusion of night but without things being so dark that the action cannot be discerned.
Gallagher is disturbing and frightening as the murderer and to give the actor credit he is more terrifying with the mask off. Siegel is spot on as the grimly determined writer living in a silent world who will not stop fighting.
In some ways “Hush” is not too dissimilar to Flanagan’s “Oculus.” Each feature a villain, in “Oculus” it is the murderous mirror and in “Hush” it s the madman with the crossbow. Each is capable of mindless violence and evil intent.
We never learn why the man is so determined to kill Maddie. To be fair there is no real need to know why. In the end, just as the mirror in “Oculus” has no real motive for its destruction of owners, it is more terrifying that such evil exists with no identifiable motivation for its actions.
The villain in this piece is more clear cut than in Flanagan’s first film about inexplicable evil, no supernatural backstory here, the monster is all too real as anyone who reads a paper or watches the news on televisions can attest.
“Hush” is a brilliant bit of filmmaking which leaves the viewer rooting for Maddie while trying to work out her next move. A splendid movie that forces the audience to identify with a heroine who is not a stereotypical horror film denizen.
This is a 4.5 star film guaranteed to get the pulse pounding in some scenes and the mind racing in others. “Hush” is streaming on Netflix at the moment. Check it out and see what you think.
Agreed! Great follow up film to Oculus!
Caught this a couple of night ago. HUSH is a RUSH!