Horror is not without its trends, and two of the more popular of the past decade have been stories about the apocalypse and allegories for mental illness. So it makes sense that Alexandre Aja’s Never Let Go aims to thread the needle, combining the multiplex-friendly world-building of A Quiet Place with A24’s more cerebral brand of ghost stories. There’s just one problem: for as strong as its performances might be, Never Let Go fails to ever coalesce into the ambitious low-fi apocalypse narrative it is so desperately chasing.
Life has only gotten harder for Momma (Halle Berry) and her boys since the end of the world. While the family was lucky enough to escape unscathed, danger lurks around every corner – one touch is all it would take for Nolan (Percy Daggs IV) or Samuel (Anthony B. Jenkins) to succumb to the creatures that stalk outside Momma’s cabin. To combat this, the family uses a series of ropes tied to the floorboards of the building – as long as they are connected to the foundation of their home, the evil in the forest has no means of getting in.
But there are more dangers in the wilderness than just the creatures. The last few winters have been tough ones for Momma and her boys, and the family is quickly running out of both food and fresh water. And when an accident causes Nolan and Samuel to temporarily untether themselves from the rope – despite Momma’s dogmatic reminders that the boys should “never let go” – Nolan begins to suspect that the threat around them might exist entirely in Momma’s head. Faced with the threat of starvation or something worse, Nolan must decide if the rules of the house are truly the boys’ salvation – or the one thing holding them back.
Never Let Go evokes immediate comparisons to the work of M. Night Shyamalan, who also uses subjective storytelling and familial deception as the core component of several of his films. But unlike Shyamalan – and despite its post-apocalyptic setting – Never Let Go is a very restrained movie. There are no flashbacks to the end of the world, no excursions to the remnants of society – the most we get to see are a few rundown vehicles lost in the woods. Most of the movie takes place in Momma’s house and the surrounding forest, with charcoal sketches in the boys’ bedroom showing what paths are safe for the rope. It’s a simple approach, but one that mostly works – it is not the location or production design that holds the movie back.
Speaking of what works: while horror movies built around child actors can sometimes be a mixed bag, both Jenkins and Daggs do a remarkable job with their characters. Samuel and Nolan – twins born minutes apart – have very different relationships with their mother, and Never Let Go is best when it’s exploring the quietly growing divide between the son who believes and the son who does not. The script by KC Coughlin and Ryan Grassby keeps these relationships grounded in love – after all, Momma is quite literally the boys’ entire world – but where there is love there is potential for jealousy, and Daggs gives a sympathetic performance as a child whose world is shifting dangerously beneath his feet.
Never Let Go also features a standout performance from Halle Berry, who has always been an underrated star of the horror genre. From the obvious (Gothika) to the overlooked (The Call), Berry signs onto interesting projects, and it is great to see her in fine form here. Much of Momma’s background is a mystery – it is hinted that she led a “very different life” in the city, and that she killed both her mother and her husband – and Berry is able to create something three-dimensional out of little more than hints and allusion.
Ultimately, though, the hints and allusions are part of the problem. Movies like Never Let Go are built around one question: are the monsters real or imagined? And maintaining that ambiguity means making creative choices that are less about developing the story and more about misleading the viewers. Sure, sometimes this can work – the more you cram your feature with lore, the more we remember the journey over the destination. But Never Let Go keeps its cards so close to its chest that there isn’t much for audiences to dig into, which means either reveal – real or imagined – will highlight just how much of the movie was misdirection to begin with.
If there’s an upside to the movie, it’s that the two young performances are so strong that one could see audiences reclaiming it as gateway horror. Given the relative lack of violence – quite the evolution for the one-time director of High Tension and The Hills Have Eyes – Never Let Go might be the rare horror movie to have benefitted from a PG-13 rating. But for now, Aja’s movie feels more like a watered down version of itself. Berry, Jenkins, and Daggs deserve all the credit in the world for keeping the story grounded, but as the saying goes, unfortunately, this is five pounds of movie in a ten pound bag. [2.5 / 5]
