The home invasion film isn’t new, and neither is a movie featuring a charming and charismatic murderer. You wouldn’t have to search hard to find a better one than The Intruder, either.
If you’ve seen the trailer, you know the story already. Annie and Scott (Meagan Good and Michael Ealy) buy a house in the country. The former owner Charlie (Dennis Quaid) won’t stop popping by uninvited. Then Charlie turns out to be a crazy murderer.
That’s a good enough story for a thriller, and Quaid’s portrayal looked sublimely loopy in the preview. Everyone loves a casting choice in a movie that makes you think, “Wow, this could be good — or really, really bad.” Remember Heath Ledger’s Joker casting for The Dark Knight setting the internet ablaze?
Quaid dives right into this role headfirst, but the film gives his psycho character little else to do besides unsolicited lawn mowing and sharing some Napa Valley grape juice with Annie. That is, until the buckshot starts flying and really devaluing his beloved former home.
I was going to say the movie could have benefited from a good twist to spice up a rather run-of-the-mill story, but then I remembered there is one. Or, rather, a loose downward spiral leading right to an obvious conclusion about Charlie’s dearly departed wife. (Hey, I’m not spoiling! It’s all there in the trailer!)
The film teeters on good old-fashioned camp but seems to butt heads with itself with its equal share of bland contemporary sleekness. Credit is apparently due to director Deon Taylor, whose “vision is iconic” according to his (self-written?) IMDb bio. Iconic here, however, means he uses other people’s iconography. Can you say, “Here’s Johnny!”?
Though all new releases daring to oppose Avengers: Endgame this month are being sweetly put to rest, I do feel The Intruder could live a happy second life as a home video/streaming nugget — something to share with friends over pizza and numerous beers. Choice cuts of dialogue like “I gotta get my ass back to Napa” help, plus the fact that Ms. Good’s hair is, well, not so good. (Someone is bound to invent a drinking game based on her bonkers wardrobe as well.)
If only the film leaned into its own inherent campiness, I think everyone would be happier. Maybe then, Charlie & Co. could find a place to call home.
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