“Fear the Night” Theatrical Poster
Action star Maggie Q (Naked Weapon, The Protégé, Nikita, Gen Y Cops, Die Hard 4) gives home invaders some butt-kicking in Fear the Night, an upcoming action-thriller from director Neil LaBute (House of Darkness).
Eight women attend a bachelorette party at a remote farmhouse in the California hills. They are interrupted by the arrival of masked intruders who surround the place and begin shooting arrows at the home and the guests. One partygoer — Tess, a military veteran who is fighting her addictions and her difficulty at fitting in with other people — leads the women in making a stand against the attackers as they fight back in an effort to save themselves over the course of a single dark night.
The film also stars Kat Foster (Jean-Claude Van Johnson), Travis Hammer (Big Sky), Gia Crovatin (Out of the Blue), Ito Aghayere (Logan Lucky), Highdee Kuan (Proximity) and KeiLyn Durrel Jones (Out of the Blue) and Laith Wallschleger (Operation Dragon).
Fear the Night is in Theaters, On Digital and On Demand on July 21, 2023 from Quiver Distribution,
It’s interesting that Neil LaBute would direct this since most of his work is based around dialogue driven drama. One of the many occurring themes of his theatre and film work is misanthropy, so one has to wonder how that will play out here.
I caught this on Amazon Prime a while back, and it was OK.
Neil LaBute’s trademark misanthropy is on full display here as even though Maggie Q’s character has PTSD from the military and is a recovering alcoholic who avoids trouble, her sister is a total asshole who’s always starting shit with her when nothing is happening, and the audience is hoping that Maggie punches her out.
The plot gets going when Maggie and her sister’s friends stop by a convenience store and she embarrasses a group of trailer trash scumbags after they harass the women. But once they follow them to their house and start attacking, one of the other stupid friends blames Maggie with the bullshit idea of “It’s your fault that they’re trying to kill us!”
There’s not much in the way of action as Maggie Q kills people quickly which makes sense in a realistic standpoint as one would want to end things as quickly as possible. Overall, the film does its job in killing time, but having very few likable characters makes it a hard watch at times.