If “John Wick” restored Keanu Reeves to the top of the A-list glory, “Knock Knock” will paralyze his actor legs so that he will never ever get up again. Eli Roth’s latest torture upon the audience takes place When a devoted husband and father (Reeves) is left home alone for the weekend, two stranded young women (Lorenza Izzo and Ana De Armas) unexpectedly knock on his door for help. What starts out as a kind gesture results in a dangerous seduction and a deadly game of cat and mouse.

To the simplest of review statements, I absolutely loathed this film. The characters are idiots and detestable on every possible level, the suspense is completely uneven to the tempo of two different films in one, and the performances are laughably bad to the point of Lifetime television stature. It’s clear that Roth was going for a humorous touch on the thriller genre, but it just doesn’t work on so many levels. The first is that the film isn’t funny at all. It tries to be “Funny Games”, but the problem in that disguise is that movie had characters who you legitimately felt sorry for. I’m not really spoiling anything here, but Reeves cheats on his wife, so we’re supposed to give a damn whether he overcomes these two psychotic women who destroy everything in the family’s home? See the problem here? these are characters that are written poorly, and nobody writes them poorer than Roth.

Going back to the subject of Reeves, i can’t imagine what made him accept a role like this. It doesn’t cast him as a performer in any kind of positive light, and he is greatly above this kind of moral filth. I would like to say the problem is all in Roth’s screenplay, but Reeves gives the absolute worst line reads of his career. His character is beyond excuses in the lack of intelligence department, and it hurts so bad when you can see something coming from a mile away when he doesn’t even gather bombshells when the girls are trying to explain it to him. With the exception of Lorenza Izzo, the film is a total waste that should’ve been left in developmental hell. Izzo is devious in her seduction and multi layered in her torture to Reeves character. She treats the film as a legit opportunity, while everyone else treats it like a laughable joke. Between this and “The Green Inferno”, she might not have the best filmography, but she makes the most of every chance given to her.

The third act and ending of the film only confirmed what i was worried about for the entirety of the 99 minute run time; it’s a big waste of time. It’s a long drawn out process for this end result that honestly could’ve been flushed out in a fifteen minute short film, and that is the biggest problem with Roth’s film. Everything moves in slow motion, when we see it’s predictability from a mile away.

“Knock Knock” is a mind numbingly bad film that doesn’t even fall back on Roth’s greatest troupes of unlimited gore. It’s a dry and non-entertaining mess that offers very little in the noteworthy department. It’s lack of scares and all around entertainment, searches for an identity that it never really finds. In a year where horror films are actually slightly above par, “Knock Knock” can’t even get on the playing field with it’s lack of criteria for the genre. You should do what Reeves character should’ve done, and just not answer the door to this opportunity. Eli Roth go away. Come again some other day.

2/10