Writer: Bragi F Schut, Maria Melnik (Screenplay)
Starring: Taylor Russell, Logan Miller, Jay Ellis, Tyler Labine, Deborah Ann Woll, Nik Dodani
Plot: Six strangers find themselves in a maze of deadly mystery rooms, and must use their wits to survive.
Tagline – Solve the Puzzle. Escape the Room. Find the clues or die.
Runtime: 1 Hour 39 Minutes
There may be spoilers in the rest of the review
Verdict: The Best Escape Room Movie
Story: Escape Room starts as we meet our six random strangers Zoey (Russell), Ben (Miller), Jason (Ellis), Mike (Labine), Amanda (Harper) and Danny (Dodani) who have been involved in a traumatic experience accept an offer for a $10,000 prize for an Escape Room.
Once inside the Escape Room, they find themselves fighting for their lives once it turns out the game isn’t a game, it is a race to survive, leading to the strangers needing to put a side their difference to escape.
Thoughts on Escape Room
Characters – Zoey is a student study quantum physics while being hiding from the world because of a traumatic experience, she keeps to herself and is dared to take a risk over the holiday. She is the smartest, even though she is the quietest. Ben is a slacker living with his own guilty for an accident, he wants to put his life back together with this game being a good start for him. Jason is a successful stock broker that has always seen himself as a winner, he takes the leader position when trying to solve the problems. Mike, Amanda and Danny complete the line-up, each has their own reason being in the game with their own trauma from their past. Danny gets to explain to the team and audience about escape rooms.
Performances – When it comes to the performances, it is clear that we have the tension from strangers working together, we see the difference and they all make themselves get their moment in the limelight. It could be fair to say that we don’t always need much in a horror, but these six get to show their grief too.
Story – The story follows 6 stranger who have been selected for an escape room, only for it to turn into a battle for survival over any game. Now we have had at least two escape room movies in the past, this thankful is the best when it comes to the story even if the rooms are wildly imaginative. The story does make it clear that each of the six has some moment of trauma in their past, which makes is clear that is why they have been selected too. My biggest issues with the story telling process, is the opening scene, which takes away any peril we feel for that character, we could have used the Danny character for the idea of escape room here. The second is that we only see the lives of three of the six which from the way I would read it, would be they are going to be the easy picks for the final three in the movie. We can say this movie does use elements from other films including ‘Cube’ only it does enough to make it, its own, the rest of the positive lead us into spoiler land so we will leave them for another day.
Mystery/Sci-Fi – The is what escape rooms are all about, the mystery of how to get out of each room, this is like many of them, which is good to see as it keeps us wondering what will happen next, the sci-fi elements play more into the bigger picture of the events going on.
Settings – Each room created has something unique about it, it will make it clear how far along we are with items being placed to remind our characters of what is happened in their past that could hold them up.
Special Effects – When it comes to the effects, we once again have high quality going on here, the ‘hatch’ room will become the biggest divide with the audience for what it achieves.
Scene of the Movie – The ‘hatch’ room.
That Moment That Annoyed Me – The opening scene.
Final Thoughts – This is easily the best escape room movie we have had to date, it will keep you guessing, characters that make sense and is ready for bigger ideas too.
Overall: Enjoyable mystery thriller.
Rating