Knock Knock is a film directed by Eli Roth, it was also written by him & two other men and it’s a remake of a 70s film called Death Game. It certainly feels like it got its politics and campiness from the 70s film. I can’t imagine watching Death Game and feeling like it needed remaking for a modern audience. I’d certainly add it to the list of films that are more about backlashing against feminism, such as Jurassic World, than I would saying it’s a film feminist’s would like – you know, like Eli Roth said. When I first heard about Knock Knock, seeing that it was a film about sexy women hurting some poor man I instantly thought it sounded dreadfully sexist (of course it is) but then for the director to go oh well nah they’ll love it is just so typical and embarrassing.
Basically
the plot goes like this: one night a family man (the most loving, amazing,
perfect husband and father) is at home working while his family have gone away
for the weekend (join us Daddy! No I can’t, I have to catch up on being an
architect as you can tell how successful I am at it by my amazing house) and
then there is, you guessed it, a knock at his door. It’s raining heavily and
there are two young women at the door drenched and they explain that they were
trying to find a party but their taxi driver misheard them and took them to
completely the wrong place and can they come in and use his phone. So instead
of being a jerk, and come on what could these innocent women possibly do to
him, he lets them in; eventually they’re in dressing gowns as their clothes dry
and Keanu Reeves’ character Evan acts like they’re so weird for not wanting to
sit in soaking clothes but oh they’re cute and young and isn’t it just all great.
Then they ‘seduce’
him because you know that thing where men just literally lose all their faculties
and use of their brain when a woman makes a move on him – frankly I’d say that
makes them dangerous people to run the world if that’s all it takes for them to
become idiots. So he sleeps with them, a lot – in the bed he shares with his
wife, in his shower and then the next morning is when things change. He awakes
to find his house trashed, and as the film goes on they tie him and make him
sit there as they write things like ‘whore’ on a picture of his young daughter
and all the rest – feminism, remember. Then they start to play a game, they
explain how they have done this many times – go to a house where a man is
alone, ‘seduce’ him, and then fuck with him after the fact – and they make him
answer questions about how many man say no (none).
Then they
tell him how he’s now a paedophile because they’re both under the age of
consent, now spoilers here, they’re actually both over 18. But again the three
male writers oh so feminist that they are wanted to use an ‘erotic horror
thriller’ to make the point that maybe if you’re going to sleep with a woman
you make sure she’s old enough first. But men I hear you, women are liars, they
have fake IDs, it’s just so time consuming in between meeting a woman and
getting undressed before asking how old they are when you didn’t even bother to
ask their name! But hey, when the other option is jail…
Now amongst
all this I had a very hard time understanding really what Eli and his
co-writers wanted from me, the audience. Did they want me to be on the side of
the women? Agree with them that Evan was in the wrong (he was, but also they
were in different ways)? Or be on Evan’s side that he was perfect and instead
just the victim of two psychopathic hotties (last two words were ones used by
rotten tomato reviewers of this & the original film). I didn’t feel sorry
for Evan because yeah how hard is it to say no to sex when you’re married with
kids but also there are moments where the two women are criminals such as when
they destroy his house, his wife’s art, where they stab Evan, and you know when
they accidentally cause a man’s death, paper maché him, paint him and then call
their usual guy that disposes of bodies for them.
I mean they
clearly are criminals, who yes make good points that seduction is a stupid word
designed to excuse grown men’s actions – especially when those actions are
criminal – but at the end of the day they’re meant to be the villains and we’re
meant to root for Evan. But that’s difficult when he’s just so dreadful, so self-righteous
about how his life is ruined by nasty little women who gave him no choice but
to have sex with them – and god that speech he gives, if you’ve seen it you’ll
know the one. So really it just made me feel bored, that I was watching the
usual sexist rubbish, and that this film really shouldn’t have the word
feminist anywhere near it – other than in ‘yet another film for feminists to
avoid’.
Who I do
feel sorry for is his wife, which again is a character whose story doesn’t care
much about – she sees her trashed house at the end but mostly just looks
shocked before the film ends. But now she has to divorce her cheating husband,
move house or live in one that is defiled, mourn the loss of a close friend,
reorganise her career because her art gallery is missing its main piece that
was trashed by them and has her friend’s blood on it; she has to presumably
clean up the house – women’s work am I right! – and remove all the family
portraits that have penises drawn all over them, explain why Daddy isn’t around
anymore to her kids and generally just find a way to move forward.
Or
alternatively, if she stays with her husband despite his cheating she has to do
all of that whilst listening to her husband justify it by him going on and on
about how those psychopathic whore bitches tricked him and left him in the
ground, literally, up to his neck while he watched a video of him being raped –
yep, one of the women literally rapes him while he’s tied to a bed and the film
skips over that fact, instead it’s creepiness is her being dressed in his
daughter’s school clothes (how they fit her I’ll never know) and uses it in the
end of the film as the video of that rape is posted on Facebook for his friends
to see. She’ll have to stand by him while he rebuilds his life, she gets to
explain to all her family and friends what happened, what they saw on Facebook
and hear how dreadful that must be for Evan, and her. She’ll have to sacrifice
her time to help him emotionally while her own art exhibit goes up in flames. Not
saying that other horror films don’t have similar endings, with untold
consequences (or told ones if you watch the many dreadful sequels of so many
franchises) but this one in particular is one where Evan won’t be the only one
suffering.
Especially
if you watch the alternate ending, where Evan finds the two women playing the
same game with another man – another poor, helpless man who couldn’t help but
sleep with women – and one where he puts on black gloves and knocks on their
door for a change. I don’t doubt that that scenario would most likely end with
both of their deaths, and that if that film existed men would cheer him on –
you make those bitches pay! Ugh. In many descriptions of this film Knock Knock
is described as a man’s fantasy gone wrong, i.e. two young and sexy women
showing up at your door then having sex with you. Those women give you what
your wife can’t, they let you have fun then leave the next day without a trace,
free sex with no strings attached – unless they end up like all women are,
psychos! Again, ugh.
This film
is basically what three men think women are like, but don’t want to admit they
think women are like that. Where they take the idea of empty women who just
want to have a bit of fun and then decide their personalities would be
murdering criminals. It’s not enjoyable to watch, it’s not scary at all and it
more sounds like if someone made a film of what their mate Steve told them
about this story he heard of these two hot women – phwoar – who went crazy and
attacked his mate John, and the story ends with him and his friends sitting in
the pub going – well, that’s women: crazy.
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