No Exit
No Exit
No exit is a decent movie that struggles to find its plot.
Austin : 7.9/10
Non-Spoiler:
No Exit is a decent mystery thriller, but it ends up not being what I expected. It really isn’t a mystery movie, as the “back guy” is unveiled 25 minutes in. It is also insanely violent. The violence doesn’t serve any purpose, and it feels like it is an attempt to cover up a half baked plot. The ending is also real brutal. I’d go watch Death on the Nile or Murder on the Orient Express long before watching this.
The characters in No Exit are actually pretty good. Although they are all protagonists, they all fit a very different vibe. Lars has very off putting aura to him, but you are never quite sure if he is a red herring. Ash is the exact opposite in that he feels like a safe character, but he also seems too good to be true. I love that all of the characters are drastically different but have subtle similarities. It keeps them connected to the plot and easy to understand, but different enough that it doesn’t feel like we only need 4 characters. The dynamic between our characters is great, and I thought the writing met the tone of the movie. I think a good plot could have elevated the characters, but they did the trick anyway.
This plot is so flimsy, even for an hour and a half movie. We try to start like 3 different kinds of movies, never really go anywhere in either direction. It isn’t a mystery, it isn’t really an action movie. It does have great thriller aspects, but they feel superficial. It is all violence and filmography, and not really hung on the plot. There are a ton of loose ends here, and plot holes just seem to keep coming. We have two really good turning points, but the last 30 minutes feel like a waste. Tons of nastiness, unnecessary violence that will attempt to distract from the fact that we are moving at a snail’s pace. The ending is not good but I will touch on that in a minute.
Honestly, there are so many better movies out there right now that this probably isn’t worth the watch. It’s a decent movie from a character stand point, but I would have loved to see them dive deeper into the plot. We stay at a surface level, and it makes it more boring than it should have been. Decent movie, but nothing worth calling home about.
Spoiler:
That nail scene was gross. It was also funny. It summed up the entire movie quite well, although it was more important for our characters than the plot. I thought the ending was really brutal. It is a super cool transition, but I thought they were trying to say it was all a dream. We get no hints on how Darby survived, how Jay survived, what happened with Jay. We get a scene at the end with Darby’s sister that shows maybe some reconciliation there, but it is just way too many loose ends for a movie that isn’t getting a sequel.
Nathanyal : 8.0/10
Non-Spoiler:
No Exit is another one of those movies that has you on the edge of your seat the entire time. Unlike other movies, like Unhinged, but instead of constant action, there was a bit of mystery involved as well. I really liked the way the movie portrayed all the characters and I enjoyed watching Darby figure everything out. I guess you could say, there was an imposter among them.
I guess on the negative side, the movie did feel quite drawn out. For being one and a half hours, I feel like the balance of the fast scenes and slow scenes weren’t enough. There was a lot of action back-to-back, but when the story slows down, I feel like it slowed down too much.
Besides that, I did enjoy the characters. I’ll talk more about them in the spoiler section, but I liked seeing the motivations and the uniqueness of each person. They felt decently real, and if this were a real situation, it would be terrifying.
Overall, No Exit was a good movie. With enough suspense and action to keep you going, it’s worth a watch if you’re into the genre.
Spoiler:
There are only a few points that I want to cover here in the spoiler section. For one, I really liked how they handled the reveal of the kidnappers. Judging from the skittishness of Lars, I had my suspicions that he was the kidnapper. But when it was revealed that Ash was in on it, followed by Sandi. It was fun to watch all these characters interact with one another for sure.
Final thing here that I want to mention was that the amount of death kind of shocked me, kind of didn’t. I had a feeling a lot of people were going to die, but when Ed and Sandi were shot, that happened a lot faster than I expected. I also didn’t expect the police officer to show up and die as well. I kind of felt bad for Lars. He was a misguided character, and his death was a brutal one.
As I stated earlier, if you’re into the genre, then this is one you’ll enjoy watching.
