An Average Movie-Goer’s Review
No spoilers! If you would like spoilers – check out the Spoiler post
I love horror movies and if I’m going to watch them anyway, why not write an entertaining/funny review from the POV of an average movie-goer and not a professional critic.
Today we’re looking at the 2019’s Countdown
When Quinn (Elizabeth Lail) downloads an app that countdowns to your death, she learns she has three days left to live and now must find a way to stop the curse behind the app.
Is Countdown (2019) Scary?
Surprisingly Countdown has some creepy tense scenes but unfortunately, because of the premise of the movie, you’re not too scared. There are some effective jump scares mainly because they’re earned but that’s not true for the entire movie. Overall you won’t leave Countdown too scared unless you recently downloaded an app that tells you when you’re going to die.
Review:
Countdown is good. It has good acting, okay dialogue, and the pacing of the movie works really well. It was a suprisingly good movie; usually movies with a premise that feels gimmicky are pretty bad. An app that tells you when you’re going to die is very gimmicky but it’s handled well for the most part.
Unfortunately, the premise does also lead to the biggest problem this movie has, there is no tension. Since the whole point of the movie is that an app tells you when you’re going to die, when characters appear to be in danger you know they’ll be fine and there’s no reason to fear for the character. Sure the jump scares will get you but a big part of horror comes from not knowing if the character will survive. It’s a spoiler that the movie gives the audience themselves.
Apart from that, most of the scenes where the characters are in danger of a supernatural presence are well done. There is great tension build-up and great payoffs. Sure the payoffs are usually jump scares but they’re earned. For the most part, it isn’t normal activity then a jump scare, it’s usually a tense build-up then a jump scare.
The other problem I had with the movie is the weird tonal shift when a specific character is introduced. Up until that point the movie had taken itself pretty seriously and it was working. At one point the movie tries to give a comic relief character and it just feels unnatural. The movie does introduce another comic relief character that works extremely well but when it tries the second time, it feels forced.
Overall I recommend giving Countdown a watch, it’s well-done, entertaining, and feels like a perfectly average movie; it doesn’t want to be one of those artsy pretentious horror movies and doesn’t even want to try.
Cast IMDB