No One Will Save You is a 2023 horror thriller directed by Brian Duffield, and starring Kaitlyn Dever. Duffield’s second directorial effort is the product of Fox Searchlight Studios and is currently streaming on Hulu. Dever has previously found screen success in roles in Booksmart and Beautiful Boy.
No One Will Save You is an interesting experiment and I’m not surprised that it found a home at Searchlight. I often associate that Fox sub-studio as the indie label that snaps up the stuff that A24 passes on. While I think that it would have performed better in theaters, much like last year’s Prey, clearly whoever is running distribution at Searchlight disagrees with me.
…an interesting experiment…
This movie is very quiet. There’s next to zero dialogue. The score is very understated and all that mixed together really drives up the creep factor. Watching this at home, I was able to leave a light on and check my phone instead of being forced to stare at the screen. No matter how hard I try, I usually end up looking at my phone during a home movie. I think I would have liked No One Will Save You if I had been forcibly immersed in it by the organic theater experience.
Since it’s such a quiet movie, I found myself paying even more attention to the cinematography. I found it to be very inventive. There were some interesting shots that were neat to watch unfold, but there was an equal number of genre trope shots. The subject of each shot was usually Dever’s character or an alien with varying designs. They went with the little green men version and then jazzed it up as the movie went on. There were a few unsettling designs but I would have liked to see something a little more distinct.
… very inventive.
When Dever was on screen, she had to really make her facial expressions do all the heavy lifting. That can be a good thing or a bad thing depending on the story but in this instance, I don’t hate it. I wouldn’t have minded some dialogue sprinkled sparsely throughout. The character lives alone so it makes sense for her to not talk out loud. But when she interacts with other humans, why not have some dialogue? Or at least other characters yelling at Dever’s character.
And why would they be yelling at Dever you may ask? Well, the movie will eventually drip-feed that info out to you. If you haven’t watched it, I won’t spoil it but it’s not what you’d expect. It’s interesting to a point but it ends up being kinda flat. Take the best parts of Signs and then jam in a couple of extra twists that don’t really land and there ya go.
If you want something a little creepy to watch this Halloween season, turn the lights off, mute your phone, and throw this one. The tension is good at moments and the twists are amusing at best, but confusing at worst. The ending will definitely leave you scratching your head a little bit.
Score: 72/100
Directed by: Brian Duffield
Released: 2023
Studio: Fox Searchlight
Starring: Kaitlyn Dever