Delayed Reaction: John & the Hole

Premise: A 13-year-old boy traps his family in a hole, because, reasons.

 

Who hasn't wanted to drug their parents and sister and place them in an abandoned hole in a neighboring lot in a remote country house so you can live your Home Alone fantasy? We all have notebooks full of plans and graph paper diagrams of the pully system we'd use to lower them in. And we've all practiced alibis for when curious parties come snooping around. Right? That's a common childhood experience we've all had. It couldn't just be me.

 

Well, maybe John (Charlie Shotwell) didn't plan things out quite that precisely, but that is the gist of what happens in this movie. After testing out drugging other unsuspecting people, one night John knocks out his family and places them in this hole. It's not clear why he does it. The best I can gather is that it's a misguided attempt to feel like an adult. Or he's just a sociopath. It's never really clear.

 

Most of the movie is his family - dad (Michael C. Hall), mom (Jennifer Ehle), sister (Taissa Farmiga) - confused and despondent in the hole, and John living out pretty mundane fantasies about eating what he wants and driving. The driving force of this movie is the tension that something bad is going to happen. Does John kill the family? Do the police or a neighbor find out and save the family? Does John die in an accident so his family starves down there since no one knows where they are? Ultimately, I was underwhelmed with the path the conclusion the movie chose.

 

I feel bad saying that I didn't get this movie, because I suspect that if I sat down with the filmmaker, I'd realize that a lot of thought went into this that I just didn't pick up on. (I hope that's the case, at least.) It was a little dull and leaves a lot of unanswered questions. Much of my confusion comes from some scenes of a mother and daughter who seem completely unrelated to John and his family. In fact, it implies that John & the Hole is just a fable. Maybe I'm not even confused by those scenes. Maybe I get them but think the point of them is stupid, so I optimistically assume there's something I'm missing about them.

 

Simply put, John and the Hole is a really good thriller that's bogged down by trying to be cerebral. Rather than leaning into the natural thrills and tension of the premise, it makes it almost mundane. It seems more concerned with how it can't answer questions than fleshing out characters.

 

Verdict: Weakly Don't Recommend