Breaking In (2018) Review

"You broke into the wrong f***ing house!"
-Shaun Russell



After the death of her estranged father, Shaun Russell (Gabrielle Union) and her children travel to her father's rural, fortress-like mansion to prep the house in order to sell it.  Unfortunately, a gang of thieves, led by Eddie (Billy Burke), are also at the house in order to steal 4 million dollars.  Eddie and his men capture Shaun's kids and seal up the house, leaving Shaun trapped outside.  Now, Shaun has to find a way back into the house, take on the thieves, and rescue her kids.


What Sucks:

This movie was pretty bad, I'm not gonna lie.  It starts off ok, but slowly spirals down.  The movie's biggest problem is it's pacing.  Stuff happens too fast in this film.  So fast it seems almost inconsequential.  A lot of what Shaun and the thieves do doesn't really feel like it matters and it's almost as if the filmmakers were just trying to fill time to hit the 80 minute mark.  Breaking In is very short, but it feels really long, because it keeps dragging out the 3rd act.

The writing is also pretty awful.  Most of the dialogue is generic, cringe-worthy, and eye-rolling.  Plus the action scenes themselves are pretty generic.  It doesn't really do anything new.  We've seen and heard all of this before, and it's definitely been done better.  Also Ajiona Alexus, who plays Shaun's daughter is just awful.

Finally, for a movie called Breaking In, I would expect it would take some sort of challenge to actually break into the house.  It takes Shaun maybe 25 minutes to get back in the house.  The thieves forgot to close the garage door and she just kinda walks inside.  The premise of this film is solid, but the filmmakers didn't know what to do with it.


What Works:

It's not much, but there is a sequence that takes place on the roof that is solid.  Plus I liked the first fight scene in the movie.  There were some interesting set-ups and pay-offs in this fight that made me think Breaking In might be a halfway clever movie.  Of course, it doesn't do anything clever again for the rest of the run-time.

I also enjoyed Levi Meaden's character, the most useless henchman of all time.  He is stunningly bad at his job, which was kinda fun.

Finally, although he didn't get much to do, Billy Burke spends most of the movie being mildly annoyed at Shaun and at his henchmen, which is kinda fun.  He isn't outright evil, but exasperated.


Verdict:

Breaking In is a movie that had potential but completely squandered it.  It had a mildly clever first act, but doesn't do anything with it's premise.  Apart from two of the thieves, the characters range from bland to annoying.  The writing is awful, and for an 88 minutes movie (including credits), it feels like it's two hours long.  Breaking In does not got it going on.

3/10: Really Bad



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