Vacancy-2007
Director Nimród Antal
Starring Luke Wilson, Kate Beckinsale
Scott’s Review #1,127
Reviewed March 29, 2021
Grade: B-
Many times in cinema, there exists a great premise for a good film that is a great idea only, and the follow-through falls apart. Vacancy (2007) is one such film.
Especially a vibrant story for a horror film, the first half is way better than the latter half, as we can enjoy wondering what will happen next.
The film fumbles the football midway through, once it’s revealed who the killer (or killers?) is, and never gets its bearings back. It’s still an okay watch, but the possibilities could have taken the film to another level.<|join|>It’s still an okay watch, but the possibilities could have taken the film to another level.
Instead, we get too much predictability.
The idea seems great because it’s in a very similar territory to Alfred Hitchcock’s 1960 masterpiece, Psycho. Think Bates Motel and a crazed killer not unlike Anthony Perkins, sans the good chemistry and motivation.
Unfortunately, the killer (or killers?) has no good motivation.
Vacancy is a mish-mash of other recent horror efforts, including Saw (2004), Hostel (2005), and Joy Ride (2001). It takes standard materials from each and mixes them to create a fabulous concoction.
This doesn’t work so well. Instead, it just feels like a combination of the other films with a similar look and feel.
Since director Nimród Antal is Hungarian, this would explain the Hostel pattern, which also features a European vibe, even though Vacancy is set somewhere off a mountain road in the United States.
A young couple lost in a deserted area near a seedy hotel will likely freak anyone out. What if my car breaks down, I have no cell phone, and I’m not sure where I am? The viewer immediately thinks:
Throw in a serial killer, and you’ve frightened the bejeesus out of just about anyone. To make matters worse, the characters in Vacancy choose to watch horror films on television for fun- not a smart decision.
When David’s (Luke Wilson) and Amy’s (Kate Beckinsale) car breaks down, they have no choice but to spend the night at a remote hotel. The couple decides to make the best of it by entertaining themselves with low-budget slasher movies on TV.
They suddenly realize that the horrifying images they see are being recorded in the room where they are staying!
With hidden cameras capturing their every move, David and Amy must find a way out before they become the latest stars in another film in the series of snuff films.
At first, they panic, then try to use their good sense to figure out what the hell is going on and how to escape this crazy hotel room.
Besides the plot loopholes, there is not good chemistry between Wilson and Beckinsale which doesn’t do the film any favors.
David and Amy are merely your average, ordinary horror movie characters. They are on the verge of divorce due to some family tragedy that is never explained, nor does it have anything to do with the events.
They have some measure of smarts, and it’s interesting to see how they finagle out of their peril, but they are not James Bond either, so their actions are implausible and become riddled with B-movie cliches.
By the halfway point, Vacancy, which starts quite well, is reduced to a standard horror film with an average cat-and-mouse final sequence that makes it completely predictable.
Speaking of cliches, Antal adds the too-good-to-be-true auto mechanic played by Ethan Embry, the prime suspect, and Mason, the desk clerk.
Is he a suspect, too? These characters are a hybrid of Norman Bates and, to a certain extent, make the film fun. Once their true colors are revealed, it becomes silly.
Luke Wilson and Kate Beckinsale do what they can with a less-than-spectacular script that takes us into familiar territory and borrows way too much from other films.
Vacancy (2007) has some potential that never becomes realized or feels very fresh.
