The premise had me. A family gets trapped inside their own house, and you watch them figure out how to survive. That kind of setup is great, and early on there were some clever ideas that made me think it could go somewhere.
The best part was watching the family pull closer together because of the situation. There’s honesty in the small stuff too. They save tomato seeds to grow food, and the movie stops to deal with something as basic as where the dog is supposed to go to the bathroom. Little details like that make a story feel lived in, and I appreciated the effort.
Then it lost me. The movie asks you to swallow way too much. Everything feels fragile and uncertain, and then it jumps ahead five years to a fully working indoor garden like that was the plan all along. I don’t mind a time skip when it’s earned. This one wasn’t. Up to that point, I had no reason to believe this family could survive five weeks, let alone five years. So instead of feeling relieved for them, I just felt confused about how we got there.
I usually give a shaky movie 30 minutes before I bail. At the half-hour mark, this was still on thin ice. I stuck around hoping it would find its footing. It didn’t.
There’s a good idea buried in here, and a couple of sweet moments. But the story never convinced me its own world made sense. Skip this one unless the premise alone is enough to carry you.
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