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Strangers, The
Rogue Pictures (Universal Pictures)


7.0

based on 27 reviews
Read critic reviews
How did we calculate this?

based on 113 votes
Read user comments
Rate this movie

MPAA RATING: R for violence/terror and language

Starring Liv Tyler, Scott Speedman, Gemma Ward, Kip Weeks, Laura Margolis, and Glenn Howerton

The Strangers is a terrifying suspense thriller about a couple whose remote getaway becomes a place of terror when masked strangers invade. The confrontation forces Kristen and James to go far beyond what they thought themselves capable of if they hope to survive. (Rogue Pictures)

GENRE(S):	Horror \| Mystery \| Suspense/Thriller
WRITTEN BY:	Bryan Bertino
DIRECTED BY:	Bryan Bertino
RELEASE DATE:	Theatrical: May 30, 2008
RUNNING TIME:	90 minutes, Color
ORIGIN:	USA

All critic scores are converted to a 100-point scale. If a critic does not indicate a score, we assign a score based on the general impression given by the text of the review. Learn more...

The Onion (A.V. Club) Scott Tobias

It isn't particularly original--for one, it owes an unacknowledged debt to the French film "Them"--but as an exercise in controlled mayhem, horror movies don't get much scarier.

The New York Times Jeannette Catsoulis

This is no splatter movie: spare, suspenseful and brilliantly invested in silence, Bryan Bertino's debut feature unfolds in a slow crescendo of intimidation.

The Hollywood Reporter Michael Rechtshaffen

A spare, creepily atmospheric psychological thriller with a death grip on the psychological aspect.

The Globe and Mail (Toronto) Jennie Punter

Both Speedman and Tyler deliver solid, nuanced performances as a couple caught at the most fragile moment in their relationship.

TV Guide Maitland McDonagh

There's nothing more to it than meets the eye, but Bertino understands the mechanics of suspense and knows how to use them.

Chicago Tribune Jessica Reaves

Bertino's taut, spare thriller is plenty scary without relying on pseudo-historical context. Anchored by convincing performances from Scott Speedman and Liv Tyler, both of whom elevate their roles above the standard horror-movie caricature, this is an enormously unsettling movie.

ReelViews James Berardinelli

This is one of those rare horror movies that concentrates on suspense and terror rather than on gore and a high body count.

Village Voice Ed Gonzalez

Bertino teases with the unknown until he's left no pimple ungoosed. Sometimes avoiding the synapse-raping bad habits of splat packers Eli Roth and Alexandre Aja is its own reward; doing so without also submitting to Michael Haneke–style hand-slapping is nearly monumental.

Variety Dennis Harvey

It's all efficiently nerve-jangling, with Tyler and Speedman credibly registering every hue of panic. Still, after such a long, creepy, cannily restrained buildup, it must be said the resolution is rather flat, a full-circle postscript rote.

Chicago Reader J.R. Jones

There's nothing remotely new here, but the movie has the taut, queasy feel of an early 70s drive-in shocker: old-fashioned suspense without any guarantee of old-fashioned mercy.

Entertainment Weekly Owen Gleiberman

Bryan Bertino, stages The Strangers' early scenes with spooky panache...But then comes the blood, the shrieking midnight chase scenes, the anything-goes over-the-top-ness. In other words, everything that we liked the movie for not being.

Austin Chronicle Marjorie Baumgarten

Younger viewers who've cut their teeth on the instant horrors of modern "torture porn" may find The Stranger's pace and psychological upsets more slow-going than they might like. Yet a film like this may be just the bracing corrective the modern horror film needs.

New York Daily News Elizabeth Weitzman

Bertino does an excellent job building dread, especially during the first half of the movie. Every silence, pause and sudden noise startles - and the results, frankly, are more frightening than the graphic torture scenes in movies like "Hostel" and "Saw."

Film Threat Rick Kisonak

Ultimately, The Strangers does succeed in the sense that it offers a riveting, vastly credible enactment of everyone's worst nightmare.

Portland Oregonian M. E. Russell

As pointless suspense exercises go, The Strangers at least gets off to a good start.

Miami Herald Rene Rodriguez

You can only string an audience along for so long with scary masks and sudden appearances at the window, and after a while, the suspense starts seeping out of The Strangers, because you realize that's all there's going to be to the movie.

Chicago Sun-Times Roger Ebert

The movie deserves more stars for its bottom-line craft, but all the craft in the world can't redeem its story.

NPR Bob Mondello

What possessed Liv Tyler to take a role in this sadistic, unmotivated home-invasion flick.

Christian Science Monitor Peter Rainer

Sometimes, dear reader, there's no place like home, and that's just where you should be when this gorefest opens at a theater near you.

San Francisco Chronicle Mick LaSalle

Here's the tricky thing about The Strangers. Sure, it uses cinema to ends that are objectionable and vile ... but it does it well, with more than usual skill.

Charlotte Observer Lawrence Toppman

Bertino directs at a funereal pace. Speedman remains comatose, though Tyler flickers fitfully to life. The mournful look on her face suggests she's remembering the days when she was given more psychologically complex scripts, such as "Armageddon."

Philadelphia Inquirer Steven Rea

No one is getting at anything in The Strangers, except the cheapest, ugliest kind of sadistic titillation.

Seattle Post-Intelligencer William Arnold

Is Hollywood so disconnected from its past and bankrupt of ideas that it doesn't even know this movie is a screaming cliché?

Washington Post Stephen Hunter

I like watching snakes eat mice just as much as the next fella, maybe even more, but The Strangers turns the gobble-'em-up into an ordeal. It's a fraud from start to finish.

New York Post Kyle Smith

The bad movie in my head was far better than the one on-screen, which offers no twists at all. A twist? There isn't even a curl or a bend.

Boston Globe Wesley Morris

A horror film with a moral. No matter how nasty a gang of murderers is, the moviemaker calling the shots is ultimately worse.

Baltimore Sun Michael Sragow

All it offers is sadism, impure and simple.

The average user rating for this movie is 7.0 (out of 10) based on 113 User Votes
Note: User votes are NOT included in the Metascore calculation.

J Williams gave it a5:
One of the better "scary" movies that has been out in a few years. The acting is well done and the suspense is genuine. But as with all horror movies you have the "how stupid can you get" moments. Just because a girl is wearing a mask wouldn't make it any more difficult for a guy to kick her ass. A shotgun vs. 3 looney tunes, the shotgun still wins. The mind trip is supposed to be the randomness of the killers acts, that this could happen to anyone. By trying encite paranoia in the moviegoer, the movie became status quo. Eventually I want to see a horror movie where the victims make all the right decisions but the killers make better ones.

Bobby E gave it a3:
Good actining, a bit scary and jumpy but as a movie I didn't do it for me and forget about the ending which was atrocious. If it had a good ending or one that made sense at least then this would've been a decent film but other than it not being realistic to me and having such a disappointing ending I will have to advise others to skip this until it hits dvd.

Barry C. gave it a0:
Don't bother ever watching this snooze-fest bore of a film. Halfway through the film in the theater I was dozing off. The acting is boorish, and the killers have absolutely no personality or motivation. I held an interest in where the plot would go near the end of the film, but was sorely disappointed to find out that the whole puke piece of garbage really has no resolution or redeeming moments. Don't even watch this turd if someone is offering you money to do so.

Mike L. gave it a9:
The Strangers was a well put together psychlogical thriller which poses the question, "can this really happen to me?". Instead of using over the top blood and gore like most movies in our time period, the strangers use shadows, sounds and silence to frighten the audience.

Jim O gave it an8:
Very solid title. Not many flaws. Enjoyable and entertaining. Should not miss this film.

Ashleigh R. gave it an8:
I thought this movie was more disturbing than scary...I watch tons of crime shows and found this movie so disturbing because I have seen that stuff like this really happens to people... I thought the movie was fun, thrilling, and exciting.

Clay T. gave it an8:
There is not much plot to The Strangers, but it doesn't need one. The movie's bare simplicity allows it to capitalize on carnal fears. A movie hasn't shaken me to my core like this since I was a lad. There is nothing particularly special about this flick, but something about it is amazingly creepy.

Strangers, The Rogue Pictures (Universal Pictures)

Strangers, The
Rogue Pictures (Universal Pictures)