“The Guest” Shows Promise, Then Blows Up
By Skip Sheffield
British actor Dan Stevens has piercing baby blue eyes that
could cut through anything with their menacing intensity.
I suspect Stevens’ peepers were enhanced with contact lenses
for his role as the mysterious, too-good-to-be-true American Army veteran known as David
in “The Guest,” a thriller by Simon Barrett (V/H/S, “You’re Next”) and directed
by Adam Wingard.
David shows up at the front door of Laura Peterson (Sheila
Kelley), who warily but unwisely lets in the handsome, smiling young military
man who claims he was in the same company with Mrs. Peterson’s son Kevin, who
was recently killed in action.
“David” claims it was Kevin’s deathbed wish for him to visit
the Peterson family and tells each and every one that Kevin loved them.
Laura Peterson is immediately drawn in by the charming,
helpful stranger. Her husband Spencer (Leland Orser) is initially suspicious,
but David, a master of flattery, soon wins him over.
David proves himself a hero to middle school-aged Luke
Peterson (Brendan Meyer) who has been mercilessly bullied by punk jocks. An
incident in an offsite bar dispatches the bullies with extreme prejudice.
By this time it is clear to the viewer David may have a
problem with Anger Management.
When David escorts underage but precocious Anna Peterson (Maika
Monroe) to a wild party she should not be attending, David once again saves the
day. When David asks one of Anna’s drug-dealing friends if he knows where he
can get a gun, it is obvious to all but the densest viewer this guy David is
big trouble.
“The Guest” is the kind of movie that builds a promising
amount of suspense and ominous foreboding, only to blow it all in an orgy of
cops who can’t shoot straight, machine guns that can’t kill, grenades, car chases
and car crashes, all culminating in a confrontation in a creepy haunted house
in a public school which conveniently has no law enforcement in sight until the
bad stuff is over.
Still we are impressed with this Dan Stevens chap, who is
best known for his role in “Downton Abbey,” which he gave up to branch into
movies. It’s as if the steely special ops guy in “The Guest” and the
drug-addled, revenge-seeking stoner in “Walk Among the Tombstones” are creatures
from different planets. That’s what’s known as acting. Stevens next appears as
Sir Lancelot in “Night at the Museum 3.”
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