Prime Video has some great new additions in August, including 56 new movies and 13 new TV shows, but the one I’m recommending today has a divisive 49% Rotten Tomatoes rating.
An aggregator site is usually a decent indicator of quality. For example, my 5-star review of Weapons matches the critics’ consensus of 96%, but sometimes we find ourselves disagreeing with the overall opinion.
Personally, I was very excited to see the 2008 home invasion movie The Strangers on there this month. But a quick glance at Rotten Tomatoes would tell you it was “rotten”, as it’s got 49%, meaning it’s not good enough for our best Prime Video movies round-up.
But it’s one of my personal favorites, and I’m here to tell you why you should give it a go, alongside the 7 new horror movies on Prime Video, Shudder, HBO Max, and more that were added this month.
Why you should give The Strangers a chance
Unlike the characters in the movie, who should’ve run a mile, I’m inviting you to invite the titular strangers into your homes. This is a great movie to watch on the best streaming services, because being on the couch watching a home invasion horror always hits different.
The premise is simple and follows a young couple who are terrorized by three masked assailants over the course of a single evening at a remote summer home, featuring everything you could want from a movie like this.
The Strangers joins plenty of other movies in the home invasion sub-genre, but I don’t really understand why it’s been received so poorly. It follows the formula perfectly and still manages to shock you.
There are some really effective scares in The Strangers and some great tension building throughout, and the complicated relationship between the two leads only strengthens the isolation.
James (Scott Speedman) and Kristen (Liv Tyler) aren’t much comfort for each other, as they’re dealing with the uncomfortable aftermath of a rejected marriage proposal. This awkwardness and sense of melancholy seem to drive them both apart, so even though there are attempts at reassurance, when the attackers strike, the whole atmosphere just feels awful.
The movie does a lot with a relatively small cast made up of Speedman, Tyler, the three masked intruders, and Glenn Howerton as Mike, James’ friend who had been contacted to come and pick him up following the romantic rejection.
One of the reasons this movie was judged so harshly is that we don’t really find out why the attackers have chosen to target this home. Perhaps a lack of motive is frustrating to some, but I found the random act of violence quite compelling.
This is also Bryan Bertino’s directorial debut, and to me, it was a solid effort indeed, and like it or loathe it, the movie has become well-known in horror circles, so it, thankfully, hasn’t faded into obscurity.
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lucy.buglass@futurenet.com (Lucy Buglass)
