The Desperate Hour

"Everyone involved with this thing should've known better."

"The only thing I want less than a thriller about a school shooting is a thriller whose other main character is the main character’s iPhone."

"The Desperate Hour’s broad, vague rendering of its characters is part and parcel of its troubling approach to its material..."

"Even if the idea of The Desperate Hour makes you uneasy, you will be engrossed by it."

"Watts’s bright-eyed charisma and obvious commitment passes the time... (and Noyce) does his best to keep things visually fresh."

"Watching an hour of Watts breathing heavily as she runs and gets more frantic, her eyes ever widening, isn’t that much fun."

"[A] maudlin, truly terrible thriller that relies far too heavily on manipulation and narrative revision to deliver a “message” that we don’t need to be spelled out for us."

"A case study in how storytelling contrivances can sabotage a courageously vulnerable performance, the movie addresses American parents’ deepest fears but is just one or two steps away from inviting ritualized communal mockery, à la The Room, at midnight screenings."

"Before things go south, there’s an effectively clammy escalation of panic as Watts leaps from call to call... But the script, from Chris Sparling... isn’t quite ingenious enough to find ways to involve her in the drama."

"Watts’ commitment holds the movie together. She acts as if that phone were her flesh-and-blood partner. But it’s not. It’s a device impersonating something human. And so is Lakewood."

"I'm sure Lakewood had its heart in the right place, and Watts, gosh love her, is really trying, since she's pretty much the only person on screen for most of the movie. But every step Amy takes towards the school is another misstep the movie makes..."

"Directed with brisk efficiency by Philip Noyce, the mix of adrenaline-rush emotion, manipulative melodrama and moralising is surprisingly entertaining in the moment."

"In the end, I’m not sure if thriller, drama, or action would be best suited to describe Lakewood. Maybe it is not quite the edge-of-the-seat movie one might expect, but it is entertaining enough to keep one fully engaged."