DON'T BREATHE 2

US, 2021, 98 minutes, Colour.

Stephen Lang, Madalyn Grace, Brendan Sexton III, Adam Young, Rocci Williams, Christian Zagia, Fiona O'Shaugnhessy.

Directed by Rodo Sayagues

An apt comment by a blogger who enjoyed this film and is irritated by others who like to run down this kind of horror film. ‘You literally can't make a decent horror film without getting slaughtered by couch critics.’

This is a sequel to Don’t Breathe which actually made a good impression on critics and audiences. It featured Stephen Lang as ex-military, blind, loner, threatened, fighting back. Which is, more or less, what happens in this sequel.

Stephen Lang is always a strong screen presence giving this film some substance – along with the conventions of this kind of horror action film.

1. The impact of the original? The sequel? Menace and violence?
2. The old house, the interiors, the adjacent buildings, the countryside, the visit to town, the garage, the toilet, menace? The building for the surgery? The musical score?
3. The blind man, with Phoenix, saving her from the fire five years earlier? Protecting her? Their life together, his caring, the meals, the dog, going out shooting? Allowing her to go the visit to town, enjoying it?
4. The friend, taking Phoenix to town, the episode at the garage, the cars blocking the road, her moving them on, her being killed?
5. The information about the racket in stolen organs? Background for the doctor, the mother and her wanting Phoenix’s heart?
6. The Blind man, Navy Seal, age, living alone? The threats from the invaders, his military skills, wielding weapons? The attacks, his being beaten? His tactics and the variety of deaths – particularly gory in close-up? Rescuing Phoenix, getting her to escape, getting to town? The dog, enclosing it in the Attic, it’s getting free, helping the Blind man, leading him to the surgery?
7. The aggressors, sense of menace, brutality, the killings? The Blind man and his attack, their beating him, yet his outwitting them, the gun in the water? The survivor, not approving of the surgery, helping the Blind man to find Phoenix?
8. Phoenix, the abduction, railing, costing Phoenix at the garage, the house invasion, his wanting to take her, his revelation about the Blind man, his being her father, in jail, the mother, taking Phoenix to her, the mother and her heart condition, the callous wanting Phoenix to give her heart?
9. The surgery, the doctor, the Blind man turning off the power, confusion, the attacks and deaths, the mother in the wheelchair, her death wound, over the edge, Phoenix hacking her arm, saved?
10. The Blind man, throat cut, the attack, Phoenix killing Raylan, the past and her meeting the children from the shelter, returning to them?