A Quiet Place Part II Review

This review comes from my Letterboxd profile, where I review every movie I see.

If the first Quiet Place is a tense, suspenseful thriller, the second one is a visceral, action-packed thrill ride in the best way possible. It's strange having seen the first film only a couple of days before seeing this one, as I felt like that first film straddled the line between intriguing concept and setting up characters for the sequel. That being said, if a setup movie can be as good as the first Quiet Place was and result in a movie as utterly fantastic as this, I won't complain about it in the absolute slightest. A Quiet Place Part II is the perfect example of a brilliant continuation of a film, picking up the story right where it left off while also expanding on everything that wasn't quite clear in the first film.

From the opening scenes alone, it's clear that John Krasinski has mastered his craft behind the camera. His style is absolutely unique to him, and it's almost unbelievable that a guy most known for a comedic role in one of the most acclaimed sitcoms of all time (The Office, of course) is able to write and direct this well, too. Krasinski gets to take full creative control here, having sole writing credit as well, and he demonstrates that his first attempt at crafting a horror film wasn't just a lucky break. The characters feel significantly more fleshed out and believable in this film, with everyone giving performances as phenomenal as the first film, including Cillian Murphy, who makes a wonderful new addition to the franchise. I even think Noah Jupe is better in this film than he was in the last one. He gets a lot of moments to shine in this sequel, and he pulls every one of them off brilliantly. I still can't believe the kid is English, he pulls off an American accent so well.

Genuinely, though, Krasinski's creative choices in this film blew me away. Marco Beltrami's score is great once again and the sound editing is also incredibly crucial to the story here (and used to great effect), but the picture editing impressed me even more this time around. These are some of the smoothest transitions in editing I've seen in a long time, with each cut feeling so natural as to not break any of the tension on screen. That's perhaps the element of this film that could have completely blown up in Krasinski's face -- keeping a consistent sense of intensity that isn't broken by strange cuts or character choices. There is at least one very memorable sequence in this film where Krasinski chooses to cut back and forth between every single member of this family and the obstacles they're facing, and if any of these subplots were any less interesting or high-stakes than the other, this would immediately break the tensity of the moment. However, the way Krasinski structures these face-offs to feel just as important to survive for the sake of each individual as well as for the family as a whole is absolutely brilliant, and the editing back and forth between them feels so natural and continues the flow of tension beautifully. The action sequences will have you gripping your seat as you watch these characters try to survive, as sometimes Krasinski will force a character to face a time limit that they know about while also making the audience aware of another time limit they don't know about. Everyone in this movie feels like they're constantly struggling to keep themselves and each other alive, and that sense of community along with the individual fleshing out of every character makes you care that much more.

However, something that should not and cannot go unpraised in this film for multiple reasons is everything having to do with Millicent freaking Simmons. She was the best part of Wonderstruck, she was phenomenal in the first Quiet Place, and here, she pulls off what I hope will be a career-launching performance. There is so much that is incredible about everything involving her contributions to this film. For one, she's a phenomenal actress. For two, she's actually deaf, and the opportunities that this opens up for more deaf actors and actresses to break onto the scene is incredible. For three, she really is the hero in this movie, and I think a lot of people have said it before, but it's true: when's the last time you've seen a deaf teenage girl become the hero of a mainstream horror film? Things like that just don't happen. However, I'm not just praising that element of the film just because of the novelty of that representation, I'm praising the element of the film because, in every single moment of the screenplay, the film builds up her character and allows her to EARN that heroic title. She's smart, she's strong, she's capable of holding her own, but she can't prove herself because everyone is possibly more worried about her own safety than anyone else's. Krasinski talked about how he wanted to explore the themes of parenthood with the first film, and in the sequel, I think he expands upon those themes even more with the choices he makes with how the characters are built up and how the solutions to problems eventually come to a head. These kids get to prove themselves, they get to show they're capable of more than people think despite the fact that everyone else is almost skeptical of letting them handle themselves on their own. It's genuinely incredible.

Guys, this movie blew me away in every single aspect. Its direction, cinematography, score, acting, editing (both sound and picture), writing, and consistently fast-paced intensity that never falters in the hour and a half runtime make this worthy of the continuation status that the subtitle "Part II" suggests. Sure, there are flaws with the plausibility of this film at certain key moments where it's harder to suspend your disbelief and there is a dialogue scene where the sound was mixed so poorly I could barely hear what Emily Blunt and Cillian Murphy were saying to each other, but honestly... I don't care. It's a movie that feels perfect, as Chris Stuckmann said. You can ignore those quibbles in the end of it all if it still feels plausible in the realm of the story they're trying to tell, and in my opinion, everything in this film is absolutely brilliant. Yep, I liked this film better than the first. The characters are stronger, the action is more thrilling, and to me, the narrative is much more compelling. If you loved the first Quiet Place, you're going to adore this sequel. John Krasinski, here's to the hope that you make more movies like this.

Letter Grade: A+