DON’T LET HIM IN (2011)

Streaming on Tubi!
Directed by Kelly Smith
Written by Kelly Smith & Chris Andrews
Starring Sophie Linfield, Sam Hazeldine, Gordon Alexander, Gemma Harvey, Rhys Meredith, Jason Carter

DON’T LET HIM IN is a somewhat effective thriller as a group of English twenty-somethings travel to a cabin in the woods that just happens to be the home of a serial killer dubbed the Tree Surgeon because he hangs body parts from trees after he kills his victims. Cool concept, I guess, especially around the holiday season. But just because DON’T LET HIM IN is capably shot and decently acted, it doesn’t mean that it is without its faults.

The most blaring problem with this film is the leaps in logic the story goes through in order to show a cool scene. For example, early in the film, an art class is drawing in the woods. As the art teacher peruses her students’ drawings, she sees one student further in the woods. When she looks over the student’s shoulder, it reveals a tree with body parts hanging from it. The teacher reprimands the student for not drawing what she sees until the student points out that there are body parts hanging from the tree off camera. Sure, this leads to a shock and a scream, but it makes absolutely no sense at all. Why would the student not say anything immediately after seeing the hanging body parts? No reason other than to set up a shock, yet the shock makes absolutely no sense.

The film is full of these leaps in logic. A maggot falls out of one actor’s eye for no reason other than to highlight a special effect. Other characters go through ludicrous motions just to push the story along to shocks and scares rather than having these scares occur naturally through the story. It’s as if a list of shocking moments was made and the writers had to reverse engineer the scene to fit these moments into them. Not really a sensible way to make a comprehensive story.

But as I said above, the acting is pretty good for this type of stalk and slash film. There are some fun twists throughout and red herrings are in abundance as to who the killer actually is until so many characters are killed off that it’s obvious who it is. DON’T LET HIM IN has taken note from all of the stalker movies we’ve all seen before, but when it tries to do something original, most of the time it makes no sense at all.

Check out the trailer here!!