The Purge

 

In The Purge, we get a vision of the future so improbable and downright goofy, I found myself with a big silly grin on my face as it was revealed.  Get a load of this setup - The year is 2022, and America has risen from near-financial ruin to become a Utopia.  Crime hasn't been lower, and unemployment is at 1%.  The reason behind this miraculous turn for our nation?  An annual event known solely as "The Purge", a 12 hour period in which people can act upon their most basic human instincts for violence, and kill without consequence.

Yes, because the government has sanctioned a 12 hour event in which people can violently vent out their pent-up anger toward their friends and neighbors ("unleashing the beast", as it's known in this movie), America has somehow become a better place.  Surely, you ask, there must be other reasons that our nation has improved other than just allowing us to murder each other one night a year.  You would think so, but no.  It's all about The Purge, and how it gives us freedom.  The movie tries to rationalize and explain this theory in exposition dialogue, and through talking heads that we see on TV in the background of certain scenes, informing us on how important this event is to our nation and our people.  The fact that the movie tries to explain itself makes it all the more funnier.  My favorite part is how the movie tells us that there are no police or emergency services during the 12 hours that The Purge lasts.  I guess if someone has a heart attack or slips and falls in the bathtub, they're out of luck.

My mind raced at the ludicrous possibilities of just what this world was going to be like.  Alas, we get to see very little of America under The Purge.  Instead, we follow a wealthy suburban family as they lock themselves in their home with their hi-tech security system.  The head of the household (Ethan Hawke) has gotten rich out of selling these security systems to his neighbors, who wish to hunker down and be safe during the annual Purge.  His family is made up of his understanding wife (Lena Headey), his sensitive teenage son (Max Burkholder), and his rebellious teenage daughter (Adelaide Kane) who is dating an older boy. (A fact the movie makes a big deal out of early on, but ultimately has little consequence.) We're trapped with this family inside their house the entire run of the movie.  I think writer-director James DeMonaco stumbles with this approach.  Instead of taking us to the streets and letting us see this event first hand, we're trapped in a closed surrounding, and stuck in what becomes a routine home invasion thriller.

You see, at one point during the night, the son sees a homeless man (Edwin Hodge) on the run from some attackers and screaming for help.  Taking pity, the kid briefly turns off the home security system, and invites the man inside, offering him shelter during The Purge.  Not long after that, the men who were chasing after the stranger come to the door of the family, and demand they bring him outside.  If not, they will break into the house, and kill everyone inside.  The leader of the home invaders is a rich college kid who wears a private school jacket, and a Halloween mask over his face to conceal his identity.  But if crime is legal during the 12 hours of The Purge, then why do they hide their identities in the first place?  Aren't the masks just getting in the way?  We're not supposed to think of such things, of course.  If we apply logic to this movie, it all falls apart.  But then, it kind of falls apart even if we don't.

Even if the world that The Purge creates takes extreme leaps of faith just to work, I was kind of taken in by the goofiness promised early on.  I actually found myself excited.  Once the action switches inside the home, however, it's essentially an extended sequence of the actors stumbling around in the dark, shining flashlights about, while loud jump scare noises ring out on the soundtrack.  I was disappointed to learn that even though the family has security cameras displaying what's going on outside on the streets, we don't actually get to see anything.  You would think during a 12 hour period where all crime is legal, there would at least be some rioting or looting going on outside.  Yet, aside from the night visitors, the streets outside are dead quiet.  This is a movie that promises us a goofy guilty pleasure, and instead gives us the mundane.  It's never boring, and there is some suspense to be had.  It's just always disappointing when a movie doesn't live up to its initial promise, no matter how cheesy it may be.

I guess I don't know what I expected.  The opening moments promised such a whacked out vision of the world, I thought the movie was going to just run with it.  I suppose I wanted it to be more daring, and to show us this world.  Isn't that a big part of going to the movies, to see things you've never seen before?  The stuff that happens inside the house isn't terrible, but it is a big let down.  That being said, the performances here are fine, even though no one really gets to stand out.  It never offends, and while it is obviously very violent, it never seems exploitive.  This is a well-made movie in a technical sense.  It simply never goes any further than that.

 

Maybe The Purge would have worked better as a really gutsy dark comedy, rather than a straight-forward thriller.  This world and premise cries out to be given an appropriately weird and out there approach.  It's too bad this project wasn't handed to a different director.  I can only imagine what someone like David Lynch could have done with it.

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