THE FOLLOWING REVIEW CONTAINS SPOILERS OF THE DISCUSSED FILM. READERS DISCRETION IS ADVISED.
You ever wondered what would society would be like if you can do whatever you want for one night a year? Well, The Purge has an idea for you.
PLOT
The 2013 film takes place in a dystopia where a political party dubbed the 'New Founding Fathers of America' or NFFA are voted into office and apparently save the country from economic collapse by sanctioning an annual Purge where all crime is legal and emergency services are unavailable for 12 hours in a fictional 2014. By 2022, the USA has come to be virtually crime free to the point where the unemployment rates have dropped to one percent. The story follows James Sandin who makes a living as a security system salesman. He lives in an LA gated community with his wife Mary and their children Zoey & Charlie and in this upcoming purge, they plan to avoid participation like they've done before. When the event starts, James sets up his security system while he and his family go about their everyday routines. Early into the event, Zoey would be surprised of her boyfriend Henry sneaking in, claiming he wants to confront her dad of their relationship since he's never approved of him. When Charlie looks over the security, he sees a black stranger beg for help as he is being chased by masked purgers. Feeling bad that none of the neighbors choose to do anything, he makes the reckless decision to temporarily disable the security system to allow him in his family home. When James finds out what has happened, he re engages the system just when the stranger gets in. Just when Henry announces himself, he tries to shoot him only for the Sandin patriarch to shoot back and kill him first in self defense. The masked purgers quickly arrive with their ringleader requests to surrender the stranger or they will invade the house. Since James admits the security system is not impenetrable as it appears, which would make it possible for an invasion, they choose to find him. Charlie finds him first and tries to help him hide from his parents but when they find him too, he holds Zoey at gunpoint. Their altercation gets so critical to the point where Zoey gets concussed during the commotion before they can tie the man to a chair with duct tape. After this, they start reconsidering if he's worth sacrificing for themselves. With their personal deadline passing, the purgers pull down the security system with a truck and invade as they vowed. James defends his home as long as he could when shooting down most of the purgers until being fatally stabbed by the ringleader. The villain tries to go after the rest of the family, but that backfires when Zoey shoots him after regaining consciousness. The Sandins believe they're safe when the neighbors intervene and kill the remaining purgers, but fellow neighbor Grace Ferrin expresses they have their animosity towards them since they acquired their wealth at their expense. They almost kill them, but that plan is also stopped when the stranger reappears and kills neighbor Mr. Cali while holding Grace at gunpoint. He considers killing her too out of respect to the Sandins, but Mary demands the killing to stop and to wait out the remainder of the purge. She proves her stance when slamming Grace's face onto a glass table for trying to go for a gun. Once the siren goes off to confirm the event to be over, the remaining neighbors leave as does the stranger. Mary thanks the latter for returning the favor whereas he wishes them good luck for whatever happens to them next. As the Sandins look on, the film ends with a news broadcast confirming the recent purge to be the most successful one to date.
THOUGHTS
2013 was a very interesting year for blockbusters because while superheroes were the must-sees, horror felt right behind it. Whether you were into possession horror like Evil Dead or The Conjuring, a political thriller by Blumhouse was not on my bingo card to be entertaining. Writer/Director James DeMonaco had the opportunity to discuss something provocatively important didn’t waste it. A dystopia where people commit crime one night a year that benefits economy more than humanity feels like a true possibility of where the USA is heading if it already hasn’t yet and that is what makes the film scary deep down. The rich do get richer when there are less people in need and the possibility of them being in a reality where there’s hardly one left to be the latter is heaven to them. It’s then scary knowing people would ball up their monstrosity for the one night they can get away with it. Their idea to cleanse does not benefit them per se because it only exposes their true colors and people will have the right to judge after the damage is done. Actor Rhys Wakefield using politeness as a facade for the purger ringleader to cover up his sadistic-ness comes to show that you won’t know anyone’s true colors until it’s too late. If he doesn’t make the statement obvious, Tony Oller does. He made Henry a downright 18 year old scumbag willing to kill James just to make sure no one is in his way to have sex with a teenage girl. That’s downright monstrous of a goal and it’s hard to not be un-phased about it because I’m sure actual sex predators would capitalize on the purge if they wanted to. Then you got Arija Bareikis who represented Grace as one who had entitlement that almost made sense but isn’t justified. She didn’t like how James made a fortune in his line of work because she had to be a customer for a highly advanced security system that turned out to be all for show. The jealousy and animosity is there to be understandable, but she could’ve just talked about her feelings rather than ball it up. No one really wins in this dystopia and that is part of the point; The only true winners are those who still remember humanity whereas any person still has the right to live and deserve to fight for it rather than being too mentally crippled to do it. I stand by the followup statement due to the Sandins being able to realize what was more important in society as we know it and the cast each give effective performances. Ethan Hawke was very interesting as James because he was just a guy doing his job and never intended to offend anybody. He believed in the Purge from the start because he never saw how it affected the needy until his son made a reckless call. Despite his good intentions on protecting his family from the stranger, he knew they wouldn’t be safe either way and had to take a stronger charge which he did until he couldn’t. His death was a bummer because he was far from a bad person and only blind of his selfishness. Had he had more time to see things both ways, he and his family likely would’ve not been through hell the way they did. Lena Headey was also impressive as Mary because like her husband, she was simple minded and never saw the negative effects of the purge until it came her way. Once she did, she shared the protective instincts like James did but chose to be more restraint about it because that was her way to maintain whatever morality she had left. It was the right for her to spare the neighbors because she knew it wouldn’t bring her husband back, not benefitting her at all. Now the kids are not the brightest compared to others we’ve seen onscreen beforehand, but you can’t say you haven’t had similar thoughts they had. Now Adelaide Kane definitely made Zoey come off entitled since she didn’t understand her dad’s good intentions. Once it blew up in her face since she had no idea what Henry was gonna do, she would basically tune out for the most part because it was so much for her to unravel. Before she redeems herself by protecting what was left of her family when shooting the ringleader, she told her dad that nothing is ever gonna be okay. She couldn’t be any more right because their reality changed in the blink of an eye and it can’t be undone. It’s easy to hate on Charlie since one decision set the story in motion and affected his whole family, but based on how Max Burkholder plays him, he chooses to be selfless rather than selfish. He doesn’t see the point of the purge and can’t bare seeing someone in peril if he knows he can do something about it. Considering so much unfolded for them, I do hope this family can recover from such trauma. Last but not least, Edwin Hodge was undoubtedly the biggest victim in the movie as the homeless stranger, who would return in the sequels revealing the character’s name to be Dante Bishop. The fact he was homeless proves how innocent he was since he wasn’t harming anybody unless it was self defense. He randomly chose the Sandin’s neighborhood because like anyone else, his desperation to survive the night was high. He didn’t expect to be in conflict with Charlie’s parents but if his dog tags proved anything, the man proved to have honor when defending them from the neighbors. He totally had the right to wipe out the neighbors and do whatever cleansing after what he went through, but he respected Mary’s request to spare them because even he wouldn’t be any different from them. And for that, he did what he did what he felt like he had to as the sequels progressed which you can’t blame him for. While I can give the movie a lot of credit for introducing things that haven’t been thought about before, there are still a handful of things that don’t make sense as you rewatch it. For example, would people really come to work after a purge night? Bodies would be everywhere and I don’t think anyone would be comfortable if it ain’t at least cleaned up in advance. And I really don’t want to be rooting for Henry but if he’s so determined in wanting to sleep with Zoey, he could’ve killed James after deflowering her. Also, which neighbor told the ringleader where the stranger was? Knowing who would’ve been a better foreshadow that the neighbors wanted to kill the Sandins. Not knowing that is more confusing than not figuring out how the stranger got to kill one of the purgers before even reaching the neighborhood since there’s like seven of them that could’ve jumped him instead of toying with him. Lastly, how did the ringleader not see Zoey in the hallway before she shot him? It didn’t look like she was sticking her arm out so he should’ve noticed her shadow before focusing on Mary & Charlie. Other than that, I think this movie still works for what it is. In short, The Purge is an interesting horror flick that has you thinking about you never thought you’d think of until now. You want to blend politics with horror? This is the one for you.
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