Whether viewers are wanting something a little bit scary as an alternative to all the Christmas films and TV specials, or people really will watch absolutely anything in the ‘recently added’ section, highly-panned horror The Strangers: Chapter 1 is doing quite well on Netflix UK at the moment.
The 2024 reboot (that’s not billed as a remake but kind of is) dropped on the streaming service at the start of this week, and currently sits as today’s fourth most-watched movie.
It’s right behind the British festive classic Love Actually in third place, new Netflix-excusive holiday film My Secret Santa in second place, and chart-topper Wake Up Dead Man, Netflix’s second Knives Out sequel, which dropped on the streamer after a short theatrical run.
The film stars Riverdale’s Madelaine Petsch, Teen Wolf’s Froylán Guiterrez, and The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power’s Ema Horvath as a trio forced to stay in an isolated Airbnb when their vehicle breaks down (it’s a holiday home in the original).
There, they are set upon by three masked assailants, and must try to survive the night.
Lionsgate
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To put it charitably, the film has been… not well received.
On Rotten Tomatoes, the film has 108 critic reviews collated, and only 21% of them are positive. Audiences liked it more, but only 45% of the 500 users who rated it enjoyed it.
“The original was a tightly wound nail biter, full of looming dread, but this one runs on fumes: there’s no tension or atmosphere, just recycled beats from the original, played like a cheap cover song,” wrote Detroit News.
“If [director Renny] Harlin and company are going to hew this closely to the original, why bother making this movie at all?” Mashable stated. “It’s not just that the other movie already exists. It’s also that the scares in this movie fall flat because of how we as audiences have changed since 2008.”
Lionsgate
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The Daily Beast wrote: “Renny Harlin’s thriller is a de facto remix of the franchise’s first outing, the primary difference being that whereas Bertino’s original was sleek, sinister, and deft, this do-over is noisy, dull, and dumb as a bag of rocks.
“The hapless script — written by Alan R. Cohen and Alan Freedland and based on the original — offers nothing fresh in a tiring 91 minutes, and nothing daring to justify a new Strangers film, let alone a new series…” said The New York Times.
As that last review stated, this film is actually the start of a new trilogy that was all shot back-to-back. Chapter 2 is out now, with the third on the way.
The Strangers: Chapter 1 can be streamed on Netflix now.
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Joe Anderton is a freelance news writer at Digital Spy, having worked there since 2016. In his time, he’s covered a host of live events and interviewed celebrities big and small. A big fan of TV and movies both mainstream and obscure, Joe also enjoys video games and in particular PlayStation. Joe currently does not use Twitter, but he only ever used it to tell people to watch the film Help! I’m a Fish.