Come for A Quiet Place: Day One’s hearing-enhanced aliens. Stay for endearing performances by Lupita Nyong’o, Joseph Quinn, and the world’s best feline actor. Actually, that should read actors. Nico and Schnitzel shared time, and probably a litter box, as Frodo, the world’s coolest cat. And, apparently, neither were divas on the set and both agreed to do their own stunts.
As director Michael Sarnoski (Pig) is proud to point out, it’s all a living, breathing cat on screen. Not a single kitty cat frame is CG. That’s why every time the cat’s in trouble – which is basically the whole film – the tension rises.
Given that this is a prequel to two highly successful films, Day One isn’t saddled with establishing the premise. We already know an alien invasion has decimated the earth’s population and that those who managed to survive do so by remaining quiet. A Quiet Place: Day One doesn’t move us any closer to learning why these grotesque creatures targeted our planet. Instead, the story fulfills the title’s description and concentrates on the first days of the attack.
Like A Quiet Place 1 & 2, Day One narrows the focus to just a couple of key characters. But it differentiates itself and expands the devastation by placing the central characters in New York City rather than a rural setting.
Sam (Lupita Nyong’o) is the heart of the story. A hospice patient who is angry at life, at impending death, at bad poetry, and at a nurse who insists that she socializes, Sam has no illusions about the days ahead. They will be few, but hopefully not painful. That’s all she can expect at this point, thanks to a terminal cancer diagnosis.
There’s not much Sam wants from life, but one non-negotiable is a chance to eat pizza in Harlem. Even as the world falls apart around her and as aliens decimate New York, Sam refuses to give up on pizza.
It seems like a bizarre choice for a, shall we say, last meal but as A Quiet Place: Day One goes on and her reasons are revealed, getting her to a pizza place in Harlem – and protecting Frodo at all costs – are the two quests audiences (even cat haters) will unite behind.
Sam doesn’t want company. In fact, she seems to loathe the idea of human companionship as she sets out on foot toward Harlem. All she needs is her service cat and a tote bag for the essentials. So when a terrified young British man (Joseph Quinn, Stranger Things) refuses to leave her side, her first, second, and third reactions are to try and ditch him. Frodo, on the other hand, forms an instant bond with this poor guy who’s far away from home and is struggling to come to terms with the fact he’ll never see his family or friends again. Eric’s a lost soul in a foreign country, and life’s becoming stranger by the minute.
Sam becomes his life raft in a turbulent sea, a beacon of hope, and a calming presence in a world gone mad. And Eric’s decency wins out, affording Sam the opportunity to find solace in not facing her journey alone.
A Quiet Place: Day One is an alien invasion film. No doubt about it. But it’s also an incredibly bittersweet story of facing death with dignity and grace. Oscar nominee Lupita Nyong’o does a fabulous job of infusing a sort of world-weariness into Sam, even before the aliens chose to attack. Sam’s accepted that she’s dying, but that doesn’t mean she’s ready to lay down and give up quite yet. There’s Frodo to think about and one final wish to fulfill.
What Nyong’o conveys with just her eyes is nothing short of brilliant.
Joseph Quinn earned a throng of new fans with his performance as the heavy metal-loving, Dungeons & Dragons fanatic Eddie Munson in Stranger Things. As one half of the post-apocalyptic pizza-chasing duo, Quinn’s going to expand that fan base. Cat lovers, at the very minimum, will adore his performance.
Quinn and Nyong’o find ways to say so much with extremely limited dialogue, and the connection between Sam and Eric is raw and honest. Sam tethers Eric to reality while Eric’s compassion for Sam’s circumstances makes her open her heart to this desperate stranger.
The special effects are impressive, and the aliens are disgustingly creepy and frightening, just as they were in A Quiet Place’s first two installments. There are jump scares aplenty, a smattering of lighter moments to relax the tension, and adrenaline-pumping alien action. But most of all, it’s the quieter, emotionally fraught scenes with Lupita Nyong’o and Joseph Quinn that make A Quiet Place: Day One so compelling. That, and one amazing, superheroic cat.
GRADE: B
MPAA Rating: PG-13 for violent content, bloody images, and terror
Release Date: June 28, 2024
Running Time: 1 hour 40 minutes
Studio: Paramount Pictures
This post was last modified on September 26, 2024 3:56 pm