Stream It Or Skip It: ‘Speak No Evil’ on VOD, in Which a Lively, Loony James McAvoy Elevates a Preposterous Thriller

Def Leppard, the Bangles and “Cotton Eye Joe“ enjoy prominent soundtrack placement in Speak No Evil (now streaming on VOD services like Amazon Prime Video), but the movie missed an opportunity to peen-hammer smash one right on the nose: What, no Foreigner? This English-language remake of a 2022 Danish thriller of the same name is ALL ABOUT head games, man! James McAvoy headlines this movie that’s all but guaranteed to drive you bats, since he plays a wacko gaslighting manipulator torturing people who are significantly less intelligent than we are, because they’re colorblind to all the red flags this ludicrous scenario throws at them. Bats, I tell you, bats. But there is some amusement to be gleaned from this suspenseful flick, even after it sets its plot GPS for Sillyville.

SPEAK NO EVIL: STREAM IT OR SKIP IT?

The Gist: We’ll learn later that they have a not-insignificant amount of money in the bank, and that’s why these unemployed people can afford to take a vacay to a beautiful resort in Italy. Ben (Scoot McNairy) and Louise Dalton (Mackenzie Davis) and their 11-year-old daughter Agnes (Alix West Lefler) are Americans who relocated to London for a job that didn’t pan out for Ben. He’s a bit stressed-out – who can blame him – and isn’t as patient as Louise, especially when it comes to Agnes’ anxiety, which manifests in an attachment to a stuffed bunny-slash-plot device named Hoppy. The trip is surely a distraction from daily troubles, and it’s a little more fun than they expected after they meet gregarious fellow Paddy (McAvoy) and his wife Ciara (Aisling Franciosi) and their son Ant (Dan Hough). The Daltons really hit it off with these people, who are loose and a little crazy and therefore fun, and the kids get along well. Nice nice everything’s nice and nothing could ever go wrong here. Ever. Promise!

Now let’s pause to note that Ant has a “condition” in which part of his tongue is missing, limiting his ability to communicate. In normal reality this wouldn’t be a big thing at all, but this is a movie, so that’s Something To Note, hence my noting it. We see a red flag, of course, but Ben and Louise and Agnes don’t, but we should give them some leeway because they don’t know they’re in a movie. Everyone returns home and things are back to the usual struggle and tension for the Dalton family and what might soothe that? Accepting Paddy’s invite out to the English countryside for the weekend. Louise is like but we don’t know them that well, but ultimately it seems harmless enough, right? OF COURSE. And so they go, and the locale is rather remote, which is another red flag to go with the niceness and the missing tongue, but you don’t piece this stuff together when you’re movie characters who are so deep in the screenplay forest they can’t see the screenplay trees.

From here on out, every scene is loaded like an atomic bazooka bomb. Why do Ciara and Ant have so many bruises? Why does Paddy pretend to not remember that Louise is a vegetarian and essentially force-feed her a succulent slice of roast goose? What the hell is that gross stain on Louise and Ben’s bedsheets? Why does Ant sleep in a grungy little attic room? What would Ant say if he could speak? Would he speak some (pause for dramatic effect) evil? Why is Paddy such a jokester who always effs with ya? Ah, let’s give ’em the benefit of the doubt. Jumping to the conclusion that these people are psychos is what cynical poopheads would do. 

What Movies Will It Remind You Of?: Remember Cold Creek Manor? Of course you don’t. Why would you? But I do. It’s a quasi-home invasion thriller that’s very much in the same vein as Speak No Evil, with Stephen Dorff as the nut who mercilessly gaslights poor Sharon Stone and Dennis Quaid and Kristen Stewart. It’s one of the stupidest movies I’ve ever seen. Speak No Evil isn’t nearly as stupid, rest assured.

Performance Worth Watching: If McAvoy wasn’t so entertaining and inspired here, we’d have punted Speak No Evil right out the door like it was a pushy vacuum cleaner salesman. 

Memorable Dialogue: Paddy tips his hand with a metaphor as he and Ben line up a fox in their rifle sights: “It’s not about the kill for me. It’s always been about the hunt, luring the fish onto the hook. That’s the game.”

Sex and Skin: Eh, nothing to see here. 

Our Take: There is not nothing to Speak No Evil, which pushes some upsetting domestic-abuse and what-makes-a-man-a-man fodder into the context of its preposterous-thriller plot. Writer-director James Watkins takes the time to work on and develop the characters, pairing McAvoy and McNairy, and Franciosi and Davis, for compelling and thoughtful ruminations on fatherhood, motherhood and marriage, for discussions about whether complete and utter dependence on Hoppy the Bunny should be tolerated or not. The screenplay lays a complex foundation for a relatively simple entrapment/psychological torture scenario that might crumble to pieces without such attention to thematic detail. Again, is it better to be open and give people the benefit of the doubt, or be withdrawn and suspicious with your guard up? It’s a 51/49 argument that could tip in either direction.

Not that the film is particularly poignant or profound, mind you. The final act works hard to undermine some of the film’s credulity by not only indulging bursts of brutal, borderline-horror-movie violence, but also rendering Hoppy as more plot device and heavy-handed bit of symbolism than what he should be, namely, a legit member of the Dalton family. Won’t someone think of the stuffies? 

I kid, but only a little. Watkins crafts a slick, tightly wound, often darkly funny thriller, leaning heavily on McAvoy, who beefs up his gusto like he beefed up his bis and tries and pecs and traps (he may have played Professor X, but he’s giving off more Wolverine vibes these days). His physicality is surely intentional, to render the character more intimidating, and a marked contrast to McNairy’s take on an uptight city boy who can’t pull the trigger when he’s got wild-animal game in his sights. Will he be able to later in the film, when the wild animal is a psychotic human male? No spoilers, but the fact that these people are pushed to be more than what they think they are is the saving grace of this ridiculous, audience-manipulating silliness. 

Our Call: If this movie didn’t drive you bats, it wouldn’t be doing its job. STREAM IT.

John Serba is a freelance writer and film critic based in Grand Rapids, Michigan.