Plot
A young couple staying in an isolated vacation home are terrorized by three unknown assailants.

Release Year: 2008

Rating: 6.1/10 (47,987 voted)

Critic's Score: 47/100

Director: Bryan Bertino

Stars: Scott Speedman, Liv Tyler, Gemma Ward

Storyline
After returning from a wedding reception, a couple staying in an isolated vacation house receive a knock on the door in the mid-hours of the night. What ensues is a violent invasion by three strangers, their faces hidden behind masks. The couple find themselves in a violent struggle, in which they go beyond what either of them thought capable in order to survive.

Cast:
Alex Fisher - Mormon Boy #1
Peter Clayton-Luce - Mormon Boy #2
Scott Speedman - James Hoyt
Liv Tyler - Kristen McKay
Gemma Ward - Dollface
Kip Weeks - Man in the Mask
Laura Margolis - Pin-Up Girl
Glenn Howerton - Mike

Taglines: Lock the door. Pretend you're safe.

Official Website: MySpace | Official site |

Release Date: 30 May 2008

Filming Locations: Florence, South Carolina, USA

Box Office Details

Budget: $10,000,000 (estimated)

Opening Weekend: $20,997,985 (USA) (1 June 2008) (2466 Screens)

Gross: $52,597,610 (USA)

Runtime: 86 min  | 88 min (unrated version)

Trivia:
During filming, in order to get an actual reaction from Liv Tyler, Bryan Bertino would tell her where to expect a loud bang from, but would then have the loud noise come from a completely different direction.

Goofs:
Continuity: When Dollface takes off her mask, she is wearing a jacket. The camera goes elsewhere, then goes back to Dollface, without a jacket on.

Quotes:
[first lines]
Narrator: What you are about to see is inspired by true events. According to the FBI, there are an estimated 1.4 million violent crimes in America each year. On the night of February 11, 2005, Kristen McKay and James Hoyt left a friend's wedding reception and returned to the Hoyt family's summer home. The brutal events that took place there are still not entirely known.

What a waste of time

Rating: 1/10

*** Warning *** Spoilers *** For such a short film, this managed to cram in every senseless cliché of the so-called horror genre. '...Girl runs from bad guys, girl trips, girls falls and hurts herself, girl whimpers, duh...' No character development, no depth, no sympathy for the characters. '... bad guys are harassing your house and threatening you, so OF COURSE you get hysterical, cry, and seek out every spooky noise...' So bad guys are hacking at your front door with an ax, you've got a loaded shotgun in your hand, but you don't shoot, you throw a chair at the door, Oh Wait, I've got a gun! But by the time you think to shoot the bad guys are gone. So your under attack from bad guys and it's just you, your girlfriend, and a loaded shotgun, so instead of hunkering down and letting them come to you to get shot, you leave your girlfriend alone in the un-secured house while you wander off to the tool shed to find and old ham radio. Sure, makes sense. So you go visit your friends and someone shoots out your windshield, do you: A- drive off fast and call 911, B- call 911 then run in the house to check on your friends, or C- dust yourself off, sneak into the house quietly, without ever bothering to wonder why your friend's car is wrecked, who's pickup truck that is, why the house is trashed, don't bother turning off the loud stereo, or calling out your friends' names, in fact don't even bother to look behind you to see if maybe the people who shot out your windshield are still around. That's right - C !?!Everyone who died in this movie deserved to die for being such mindless, spineless, insipid, whimpering idiots. Maybe if you've never seen a movie before, ever, or if you've had recent head trauma, or maybe if you're Amish this movie might scare you. Maybe. Don't waste your time or money.

REVISION::: it's now Sunday 6/1. I originally posted the above comment after an advance screening of this movie late-night on thursday 5/29 (because I work at a movie theater I get to see all the movies before they're released.) So I've noticed something peculiar... there are, as of now, about 8 pages of comments on this film. About 3 pages of comments before mine (meaning before the movie came out) all gave The Strangers 9 or 10 stars, glowing reviews, and taglines like "best horror movie ever," "scariest film ever," and "awesome." But then, if you look at the dates of submission, 95% of all the comments posted after the movie was released say it's lackluster at best, anticlimactic, boring, lame, and not worth watching. So, I wonder, is that a coincidence, or maybe, just maybe, were all those people who posted great comments prior to the movie's release doing it for some other reason? Were they being paid to hype the film? Do they work for the production company? Or is it all just a big coincidence? Hmmm....

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