The Long Night is a horror-thriller film directed by Rich Ragsdale. The film stars Scout Taylor-Compton, Nolan Gerard Funk, Jeff Fahey, and Deborah Kara Unger. Movies about demon believers with rituals are not new; The Long Night tries to enliven this horror subgenre with a minimalist style in a limited setting.
Grace tries to follow clues to her parents’ whereabouts in the southern US with Jack. The address they went to took them to a large house in a remote area in the middle of the forest and swamp. Strangeness after oddity began to happen ever since they got there. Until that night, they are terrorized by a group of masked people, who are not clear why they are after Grace.
The film opens with a promising premise and hopes for a big surprise in the story. However, when action and terror appear, that’s when the story begins to decrease in intensity. Many things do not make sense and do not make simple logic. What do you do if there are dozens of strangers out there who have killed someone? What is certain is that we will panic and try to run from there, or at least look for anything to protect ourselves.
Why close only the door if it’s clear that the glass window is already that big? What the hell are these demon groups waiting for? Why wait for the moment when Grace and Jack get guns? Just thinking about it is lazy because it’s too ridiculous to discuss. It doesn’t take an intelligent brain to know behind the masked person. The ending options for this kind of story are too easy to anticipate. Yes, okay, then after all that, what do you want to rule the world? Please, someone call Ghostbuster, oh no, call the Jedi Master.
The Long Night takes the theme of demonic believers with a side of thrillers, horror tricks, and mediocre story surprises. The story is not strong enough to build a side of the suspense and biting surprise. The setting is very supportive. The audience should be diverted as long as possible through tense and exciting actions so that the audience does not have time to think anywhere else. As the title suggests, The Long Night is a long, tiring wait.
