The movie is so consistently moody, and so focused on driving you towards a gut-punch finale, that even valid complaints seem negligible in retrospect.
50
Slant MagazineAbhimanyu Das
Slant MagazineAbhimanyu Das
An accumulation of dread in search of a properly fleshed-out screenplay to sustain it, the film plays like a show reel for writer-director Nicholas McCarthy's considerable craft.
50
Village VoiceAlan Scherstuhl
Village VoiceAlan Scherstuhl
In his second feature, McCarthy shows he's mastered the things we already know scare us onscreen; next, how about something we don't expect?
At the Devil’s Door is reasonably absorbing but never scary or satirically sharp (despite references to mortgages and foreclosures). It mostly settles for inducing sensation.
At the Devil’s Door (which premiered at SXSW last spring under the title “Home”) ends up too tentative and underdeveloped, playing like an attenuated prologue for a bigger film.
40
The DissolveDavid Ehrlich
The DissolveDavid Ehrlich
At The Devil’s Door is a frustrating display of craft desperately searching for purpose.
Lacks the potent scares and exploitative elements to truly please genre fans. But its thematic ambition and well-crafted elements mark the filmmaker as a talent to watch.