Samira is in the final stages of cancer. Living in a hospice care facility, she has no loved ones to care for her, and she counts down the days to her inevitable death. Her sole comfort is her cat.
Seeing Samira in the depths of depression, her nurse, Reuben, invites her on a field trip to New York City. Initially reluctant to go, she relents at the promise of getting some genuine New York pizza.
But upon arriving in the city, an unknown emergency arises. As her tour group begins to flee the city, Samira comes to a shocking realization—the Earth is under alien invasion. She quickly realizes the alien invaders are attracted to sound, and she and the other survivors can avoid slaughter by staying silent.
But as the rest of New York attempts to evacuate the city, Samira delves deeper into her alien-infested hometown on a mission to fulfill her dying wish.
If you liked the first two A Quiet Place films, you should also enjoy this one. Like its predecessors, it features a small human emotional drama unfolding against an epic sci-fi apocalypse. And if the alien invasion prologue of the second film was a highlight for you, this third film offers that on a bigger scale.
Lupita Nyong’o leads the film as Samira. She does an excellent job of conveying her character’s sense of depression, anger, and helplessness. Yet Lupita also beautifully shows us Samira’s humor, sense of nostalgia, creativity, and compassion.
It’s an interesting dichotomy: Samira no longer cares about her own life but is willing to deviate from her quest to help strangers save their own lives. It makes her a true heroine in every sense of the word.
She is well paired with Joseph Quinn as Eric. While most people know him from Stranger Things, he’s playing a dramatically different character here. Instead of facing attacking monsters by playing Metallica on an electric guitar, he’s crippled by intense fear.
It makes you want to slap him around a bit, but Samira again shows she’s the better human as she helps him navigate the alien terrors and overcome his fears. Somehow, despite being opposites in every sense of the word, Eric and Samira have great chemistry together. She rescues him physically, and he rescues her spiritually.
As for the rest of the cast, Alex Wolff has a small but memorable role as Reuben. He plays the likable hospice nurse who unintentionally puts our heroine in harm’s way. And Djimon Hounsou reprises his role as Henri.
If you’re there for the alien action more than the emotional drama, A Quiet Place: Day One also delivers on that front. There are plenty of alien jump scares, tense moments, and haunting imagery as the creatures destroy New York.
Regarding things that didn’t work, let’s first talk about the cat. It seems apparent that the writers never actually owned a cat. If they had, they’d have known no cat would quietly rest in its owner’s arms as a hostile alien stalked them.
The cat would scratch you, hiss, and leave you to die as the alien tore you to bits. The only explanation for this cat’s calm demeanor is that it is getting into Samira’s fentanyl painkillers. Despite this, it’s a cool cat that joins other feline cinema legends like Jonesy from Alien.
A Quiet Place: Day One needed to do a few things that it failed to do. The first was to expand on the invading aliens. Why are they there? Where did they come from? Who sent them? What is their intention with the Earth? This third film in the series does nothing to expand on its mythology. There is one moment when it seems like it’s about to, but then you come away knowing almost nothing new about them.
The second thing that A Quiet Place: Day One should have done was come up with new action and scares. The characters either run from rampaging aliens or cower silently as the aliens try to zero in on them.
Both of these things were done thoroughly in the first two films, and this film should have found some way to do more. It becomes a tad redundant.
If you’re content with more of what the first two A Quiet Place films offered, then you’ll be satisfied with this. Lupita Nyong’o does elevate it slightly above a standard rehash. But if you’re looking for more, you may want to wait for a fourth film.
Opening in theaters on Friday, June 28, A Quiet Place: Day One was rated PG-13 by the MPA for terror and violent content/bloody images.
A QUIET PLACE: DAY ONE RATING: 7 OUT OF 10
Scott Chitwood has been writing about film online since 1995. He is a co-founder of TheForce.Net, IGN Movies, and the Houston Film Critics Society. Scott wrote for ComingSoon until joining Vital Thrills in 2020. Scott is also the publisher of Red 5 Comics and lives in Houston, TX.