SPOILER: This column contains potential spoilers for “The Last House.”
What would you do if you woke up and found yourself trapped inside your home — stuck inside by an impenetrable barrier that separates you from the rest of the world? Would you panic and search for answers, or would you stay calm waiting to be rescued? Netflix's newest science fiction thriller, "The Last House," released Aug. 7, showcases just that.
However, even with this interesting premise, the movie’s narrative fails due to its uneven tone throughout and its lack of explanation for the many strange occurrences.
"The Last House" centers around a family, consisting of Ann (Greta Lee), her husband Jason (Wagner Moura) and their two kids Ruth (Riley Chung) and Graham (Noah Alexander Sosnowski), as they get ready to go pick out a Christmas tree. Their family outing is stopped short however when they learn that their house's front door — and every exit in their home — won't budge. But it’s not just them; everyone in their neighborhood is stuck in their homes, leaving the family to figure out how to survive and stay entertained in their confinement.
The film began as a family-driven affair.
Jason taught his kids how to fillet a fish and introduced them to his music records. Riley and Jason remained optimistic, ensuring their kids that the storms and entrapment would eventually end. And I initially enjoyed how the film focused on the family and how they were dealing with this world-altering event.
In addition, the film's beginning did a great job at showing me where the parents’ mindsets were compared to their naive children. They hoped this upbringing wouldn't scar their children but knew they had no other choice in survival. I think this parental dilemma was insightful as it showed a more realistic side to what being indefinitely stuck in your home would truly be like.
All this to say, the film's upbeat and hopeful start eventually crumbled, shifting toward a depressing showcase of the family after spending multiple years within this prison.
The family is forced to create an indoor farm and hunt outside animals using a trap that comes out of their chimney, the only outside entrance to their house that can be used. I thought the film offered an improbable explanation as to why this is the only viable opening to their house. Their chimney cap loosened over time which left a gap in the barrier, but when they broke their windows, the barrier was still there. So how could the chimney be an opening with that same logic?
The chimney, however, was not the only plot hole I found in the film. There was little explanation for many other confusing events, and when there was some sort of reasoning, they were loosely put together. For example, the family had to put their elderly dog down after they ran out of its pills. Out of desperation, Jason cut up the dog and told his wife that it would be wise to eat the meat, much to her chagrin.
Yet, the film never directly shows us if this happened. Did they actually have to eat their dog? While you could argue that it is implied rather than explicitly shown, I feel like the question of whether to eat your family pet should require a little more explanation. Especially since I think a dog dying is one of the saddest plot points that a movie can add.
But where the film felt especially flat and confusing was at its ending, where the family eventually realizes that their house is sinking and makes a last ditch effort to escape.
Now thus far, the outside has been plagued by heavy storms and ancient deep-sea creatures that they saw kill a runner outside. But when they escape using underground pipes that lead to their deceased neighbor's house, one of these creatures finds them and Jason ends up sparing it rather than killing it. And when the family finally escapes, they find themselves surrounded by a group of these creatures but are left alone because they showed mercy to one of them.
It didn’t make sense to me how the creatures that have been killing and ravaging their town would simply let them go, especially when they have been actively trying to kill the family by destroying their resources. I thought to myself that even if they were now free, how would they survive the horrible storms and not get killed by another sea monster that doesn't know about their humanity?
This implausible ending made me quite disappointed when thinking back to the film's original family-centric plot and psychologically dense exploration of being trapped in your house. While the film's first half was excitingly refreshing and sincere, the second half makes this postapocalyptic fiction narratively inconsistent.
