A Quiet Place (2018) Review – Flawed But Outstandingly Unique

Welcome to Knockout Horror and to day 7 of our 31 Days of Halloween 2026 feature. I like to use October as an opportunity to catch up on well known horror movies that released before I started this website. With that in mind, today I decided to revisit a movie I had really mixed feelings about – A Quiet Place (2018).

A Little Backstory

When I say I had mixed feelings about this movie, it doesn’t really paint a clear picture, so let me explain.

“Then, within five minutes, we get the monster reveal and that’s where I felt myself mentally check out just a little.”

I remember hearing about A Quiet Place back in 2017 and being incredibly hyped for it. The story follows a family attempting to survive after earth was invaded by blind, hyper-auditory aliens.

The concept of survivors attempting to navigate day-to-day life in a world where they can’t make a single sound was immensely intriguing. How would they cope? How do they communicate? What do the aliens look like? The narrative alone begs a ton of questions and the possibilities for sound related scares were through the roof.

The first chance we got, we headed to the cinema to watch. The cinema in question was not a quiet place because some douche behind us clearly believed that the best way to impress his date was by not shutting the fuck up for one minute during the entire film.

The opening minutes were entirely what I was expecting. Silence, communicating via sign language, ultra high stakes, and a lot of tension. Then, within five minutes, we get the monster reveal and that’s where I felt myself mentally check out just a little.

Looking back in retrospect…

At the time, I really felt as though we didn’t need to see the monster so early in the film. It diluted the tension for me in a big way. Not to mention, I didn’t think the creature design was all that interesting.

I mean, sure, it’s good to establish the rules and to raise the stakes a little, but I really don’t feel as though it was all that necessary. After all, the plot writes itself… You make noise, you are dead.

After that setup, I felt as though a lot of the film’s issues stood out to me more than the positives did.

Illogical story nuances that basically ignored ambient sounds in the environment, stupid character decisions, recycled set pieces, and diminished returns from the “don’t make any sound” trope.

It all felt a bit predictable, a little bit forced, and a tiny bit on the dull side of life. I remember leaving the cinema feeling extremely disappointed and completely unaware that I had missed everything that director and lead performer John Krasinski did right.

There is a lot to love, here

Rewatching for the first time since 2018, I realised that there is a hell of a lot to love about A Quiet Place. In fact, in a lot of ways, it achieves almost everything it sets out to achieve.

The opening, outside of the creature reveal, sets up the scene perfectly. It’s almost completely absent of sound with Charlotte Christensen’s gorgeous, warm and lush 35mm cinematography allowed to do all of the heavy lifting. The picture has a somewhat dreamlike ambience to it, despite the nightmare setting.

There’s no real tension to speak of early on because this is a family who have been dealing with this situation for a long time. They are very accustomed to their muted lifestyle.

They navigate their environment through a careful set of rules and they have taken the time to path out every single step they take. Life is ordinary outside of the extraordinary threat that they live under.

“The picture has a somewhat dreamlike ambience to it, despite the nightmare setting.”

Due to the aliens being blind, as long as they are careful, they can go about their days. The family live on a farm so are able to sustain themselves well. They aren’t struggling, really, so the first half of the movie is focused more on how they live than how they survive.

The use of sign language to communicate is a very nice touch and it allows the viewer an opportunity to immerse themselves in the family group without the need for verbal dialogue. This is, as far as horror goes, a movie unlike any other and almost timeless in how it silently plays out.

It’s quite unique

A Quiet Place feels quite unique when placed against a backdrop of facsimile apocalyptic horror films.

It’s an interesting decision on the writer’s part to have the creatures basically completely unthreatening as long as you stay quiet. It creates this odd dichotomy between the ultra normal and the ultra terrifying.

This is a family that is able to, essentially, live a normal life replete with all the mundane tasks that normal life demands. They go about their days hanging out washing, growing crops, basking in the sun, cooking food, and generally existing as normal.

It’s only when a plate drops or something gets knocked over that the horror element kicks in. The struggle to survive that is normally central to movies like this is almost completely absent. Instead, clumsiness is the main threat.

The sounds of nature are really allowed to flourish in this environment and every little noise feels enormously amplified. It’s a fascinating experience for a genre that prides itself on being loud.

Much of the film is spent indulging in this gorgeous ambience. Just normal life with the occasional threat of a brutal mauling if you happen to knock over a cup. Indeed, it’s fair to say that the early parts of the film are far more about the domestic issues that are a typical part of life rather than killer aliens.

Despite coming for scares, I really feel as though this is where A Quiet Place is at its strongest and most engaging.

So is it scary?

Things do get a lot more intense later on.

“The issues that I noticed the first time around are still very valid, however.”

I wouldn’t say A Quiet Place is a particularly scary movie; it’s more that it maintains a consistent anxiety inducing level of tension throughout. The story is setup to increasingly escalate the threat and this keeps things pretty atmospheric.

The sheer fact that the aliens here are so ruthlessly efficient makes every stubbed toe or errant sneeze a life or death situation.

Fantastic performances from the entire cast help you to really buy into the whole scenario. Nobody slips up for a second when it comes to taking the threat seriously and the rules are, for the most part, adhered to pretty tightly.

Marks on the floor to denote creaky floorboards are a nice touch and the world seems extremely lived in which helps it to feel more believable.

There’s some fairly effective scenes featuring characters sneaking around trying not to make a noise as an alien stalks the house, but A Quiet Place is at its scariest moments after a loud noise has been made and the family are left waiting on the inevitable onslaught.

I still feel as though it has significant issues

I enjoyed this movie a hell of a lot more on a rewatch. Knowing that the opening creature reveal was coming meant I could push it to one side and appreciate the movie for what it is – a beautifully shot, super atmospheric survival movie with outstanding sound design.

The issues that I noticed the first time around are still very valid, however.

The characters here are beyond dumb. The initial setup for the creature reveal involves choices that simply don’t make any sense given the situation. That is all followed up by an even more baffling decision that basically outlines how the final third of the movie will play out.

I wasn’t an enormous fan of the creature design, either. They feel extremely floaty thanks to the CGI used and they didn’t feel all that original thanks to reminding me of something from the video game Dead Space.

There’s a lot of really silly details that play a major part in the story and really undermine the careful world building that came before it. A nail sticking up through one of the stairs? Really? This is a family that took the time to mark every creaky floorboard. Do we really think they wouldn’t deal with a protruding nail?

The escalation in the later parts of the film feels extremely forced. Everything all goes wrong at once and just keeps getting worse; it almost descends into farce. The final revelation regarding the aliens is pretty ridiculous too, because it requires a suspension of disbelief that this information wouldn’t have been discovered by people in power much earlier.

A Quiet Place is still a fantastic horror movie, despite my complaints. It’s beautifully filmed, outstandingly atmospheric, and often compelling. The issues I have with it certainly don’t ruin it, they just stop it from being a much better film. It’s an easy recommend for anyone looking for something that feels genuinely unique.

Our Scoring Philosophy: A Fair Fight

Horror is a genre that thrives thanks to indie film makers and low budget creators. At Knockout Horror, we firmly believe that every movie that we review deserves a fair fight. That's why we grade on a curve. Our star ratings are all about context, judging a film on what it achieves with the resources it has.

A 4-star rating for a scrappy indie horror made for $10,000 is a testament to its ingenuity and raw power. A 4-star rating for a $100 million blockbuster means it delivered on its epic promises. We don't compare them side-by-side; we celebrate success in every weight class, from the back-alley brawler to the heavyweight champion. Please keep this in mind when considering star ratings.