When I saw the name of Eli Roth as director of this film, I should have taken that as a warning that this was probably going to be a bad movie. Roth's previous work either as director or writer were mostly crazy violent and gory just for the sake of being gory. Unlike his other films though, like the dreadful "Hostel" or the awful "Aftershock", this one had a known movie star in the lead role -- Keanu Reeves. It was because of Reeves that convinced me that I could give this film a chance.
Successful architect Evan Webber is an ideal husband of an artist wife and a model father of two. One day (ironically it was Father's Day), Evan was left behind at home because of work while the rest of his family went on a beach vacation. That night, two sexy young ladies show up at this door lost and soaking wet from the rain. Evan kindly admits them into his house so they can get dry and call for a cab. However, these two liberated girls had kinky shenanigans in mind for Evan, and then some.
In spite of the fact that the script and the acting were already pretty cheesy from the very start, the premise of the film actually seemed promising at first. Things do get interesting when the girls came into the scene and turned on their charms in an attempt to seduce the faithful family man. After that key scene though, the rest of the film turned south and just got more and more ridiculous up to the very end which unfortunately did not come right away.
Keanu Reeves is one enigmatic star whose career definitely had its ups and downs. In the beginning, he was able to balance his comedy ("Bill and Ted's Excellent Adventure"), romance ("A Walk in the Clouds"), drama ("My Own Private Idaho") and action ("Speed" and "Matrix"). Since the turn of the millennium though, his career turned for the worse, with no really memorable roles to speak of. His last two films, "47 Ronin" and "John Wick," brought his name back up for the better. However, "Knock, Knock" knocks him down again with a performance so dismal it will be long-remembered for all the wrong reasons.
Keanu Reeves' wretched portrayal of Evan Webber is simply beyond embarrassing. Reeves playing monster with his family at the start was just the first of many cringe-worthy scenes for him in the whole course of this film. As his character was threatened with death later in the film, Reeves' impassioned appeal for his life was so hilariously delivered with the craziest of words, it actually had me laughing out loud in spite of myself. Finally, when a scene came when we see Reeves' head on the ground with only his comical facial emoting, I totally lost it laughing. I cannot fathom how a star of his stature could have allowed himself to suffer such shameful indignities.
We can't really expect much from the other relatively unknown actors in the cast who also came up with similarly ludicrous performances. Lorenza Izzo (Eli Roth's wife in real life) and Ana de Armas (the hotter blonde vixen) played the two seductresses Genesis and Bel with such loony, over-the-top abandon. Aaron Burns played the gay friend Louis, who was more concerned about the artwork than people. They did look like they were having a lot of fun doing their inane scenes (even though the situations were not supposed to be funny).
What was on Eli Roth's mind when he wrote and directed this? Were all the outrageous scenarios and lousy hammy acting done on purpose to somehow make this film stand out? Was this all an elaborate warning about logging out of Facebook once you are done with it? Anyway, everything was so exaggeratedly bad it was actually uproariously funny. It was definitely not what I expected going in, but I did get a good laugh out of it so I won't call it a total disaster. 3/10.
On the contrary, it was great entertainment and I give it 8/10! As it was obviously a satire, the ham acting was all part of it. One could tell from the outset by the surfeit of large poster photos of the family everywhere that the director was going to exaggerate every foible of the human condition. All Keanu had needed was a panic button. Why didn't he have a panic button? A LOL movie with a surprise ending!
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