Film: A Quiet Place : Day One
Cast: Lupita Nyong`o, Joseph Quinn, Alex Wolff, Djimon Hounsou, Cain Aiden, Jennifer Woodward, Elijah Ungvary
Director: Michael Sarnoski
Rating: 2.5/5
Runtime: 99 min.

This film, a prequel to the super successful John Krasinski directed franchise ‘A Quiet Place,’ hopes to recreate the origin story by depicting the initial alien invasion. It’s clear from this attempt that Krasinski is definitely a far superior thriller director. The manner in which he captured destruction and created suspense was so vivid that it became hard to forget. Sarnoski, even though technically proficient, is unable to recreate that kind of potency.“Day One” promises a more expansive look at the apocalyptic mayhem but it doesn’t deliver it with any depth or consistency. The narrative informs us in the opening moments itself that sound levels in NYC is regularly 90 decibels. But the subsequent sequences fail to capture the contrast of a hustling and bustling city needing to stay quiet all of a sudden.

The people characters though are governed by their behaviors. With more than a million and a half people living on the island of Manhattan, it’s hard to understand why Samira (Lupita Nyong’o), a Stage 4 cancer patient, and Eric (Joseph Quinn), come in for special treatment. Both have no survival instincts. Samira goes against the tide of people aiming for the waterways and Eric appears to be following her for no reason at all. Samira is an abrasive anti social person and it becomes difficult to empathise with her situation while Eric comes by his panic attacks by chance. While both Nyong’o and Quinn are rivetting in their emphasis and presence, there’s little we learn about their characters all through the film.