“There is no god,” the blind man tells his prisoner near the end of Don’t Breathe. “What god would allow this to happen? There is nothing a man cannot do once he accepts that there is no god.”

Those lines form the core of Don’t Breathe‘s philosophy. It’s a tale about a world without god or justice, where might is the only right. There is purpose behind the fact that the only parental figures we see in the film are abusive and negligent. It’s no coincidence that it’s set in the ruined and largely abandoned suburbs of Detroit. It is no accident that none of the characters are truly “good.”

Don’t Breathe opens with three hooligans, Money (Daniel Zovatto), Alex (Dylan Minnette), and Rocky (Jane Levy), breaking into a house and stealing clothes, trinkets, and technology. Alex is the brains of the operation. He supplies the keys and alarm codes from his father’s home security company and warns the others not to steal more the ten thousand dollars worth of valuables (keeping them under the limit for felony grand larceny if they’re caught).

But Rocky and Alex aren’t happy with the chump change they get from robbing Alex’s way. They want to escape the hell-hole of a town they’re trapped in, and Money proposes a scheme to steal a wrongful death settlement from a blind shut-in. But the blind man proves to be more resourceful than they expected, and infinitely more dangerous.

Don’t Breathe‘s greatest power is its consistency in building tension. It mines its premise for all it is worth, accentuating every sound, making every breath the characters take seem like another step in a field full of land-mines. Don’t Breathe isn’t so much a descriptive title, as it is the thing you want to yell at the characters. There are a few important twists and turns (most of which were spoiled by the trailers) but the movie wisely doesn’t lean on them for its drama. Instead it turns up the heat one notch at a time, leaving you perched on the edge of your seat for the better part of an hour.

Stephen Lang turns out an incredible performance as the unnamed blind man, a character with a beautiful balance of menace and brokenness. He is relentless and determined, but never crosses the line into seeming inhuman or unstoppable. He is nothing more than a man who has rejected the idea of a higher power, a man who has decided that the only way to respond to an unjust word is to make his own justice.

Our protagonists aren’t “good” people by any stretch of the imagination (after all, they’re in this mess because they decide to steal grievance money from an old blind veteran), but they do represent an alternative viewpoint in this bleak world seemingly abandoned by god and government alike. Because they each in some way sacrifice themselves for the good of others. When the robbery goes sideways, Money tells the blind man he broke in alone trying to buy time for Rocky to escape. Alex goes back into the house to help his friends when he could have made a run for it. And Rocky’s prime motivation for stealing the money is so she can help her sister escape from the abusive household she grew up in.

Don’t Breathe paints a picture of a cruel and unfair world, where evil goes unpunished, and justice goes undelivered. But it reminds us that we don’t have to let it stay that way. It’s a warning that when we try to make justice for ourselves we become twisted and ugly. But if we make justice for others who are wronged, if we give our strength for those who are weak, we can make a difference in a dark world.

_____

If you liked the rundown, click the thumbnail below to check out the latest episode of the Human Echoes Podcast, where we discuss movies and more every week.



