Rating: 4.5/5 stars
If you are familiar with any movies in the “Quiet Place” franchise, then you are aware that the filmmakers try to capture suspense through the high-stakes scenario of having to stay quiet while hearing-enhanced monsters are lurking just around the corner. However, in the most recent film of the franchise, “A Quiet Place: Day One,” director Michael Sarnoski (“IF”) decides to up the stakes of this film by adding one key element: a cat.
“A Quiet Place: Day One” follows Samira, played by Lupita Nyong’o (“Black Panther”), a cancer patient who finds herself in the perils of downtown New York City after it was overrun by alien creatures. Like in the previous movies, these creatures are triggered by any noise louder than a pin drop and will kill anyone who violates their sacred silence.
However, instead of trying to escape the city via rescue boats like other citizens of New York, Samira decides to stay. The only thing she feels will complete her life: a slice of pizza from a pizzeria only found in the city. She adventures across New York with her service cat, Frodo.
Although the film did not offer any new information on the monsters as fans might have hoped, it succeeded in grabbing the audience’s attention and root for the survival of every character on screen– especially Frodo. While he might be one reason for the film’s immense success at the box office, it also did a fine job creating a gut-wrenching story about two characters and their journey to find inner peace. Like the others in John Krasinski’s famous series, Semira and Eric were written with goals and fears that were apparent with every decision they made. It was never just about surviving; rather, it was about living. It was an idea that Nyong’o’s character knew far too well. She was confronting her past with every step she took toward that pizzeria, fighting her cancer just to experience one last unforgettable moment.
Despite the film’s pitfalls, Frodo, the fearless feline portrayed by tuxedos Schnitzel and Nico, had audiences at the edge of their seats. As every pet owner knows, cats go through their nine lives very quickly. In a world where the softest meow can be a life or death situation, not everyone had high hopes for the little guy’s survival. Every time he reappeared on screen after a rather hazardous moment for the characters, the whole theater breathed a sigh of relief. However, that did not mean he made life easy for Samira and the other characters trying to stay quiet and survive.
The fictional feline’s role in the film has become such a hit that inspired a popular trend on Instagram and TikTok: whose cat would survive “The Quiet Place”? Cat owners would pick up their cats and sprint across the room with them in their arms. If their cat made a single sound, then it would be deemed that the pair would not survive “The Quiet Place” as Frodo and Samira did.
Image via Wikimedia Commons
