The First Purge (2018) - Review

Somehow this film, with the premise of showing us the political side of the Purge and how it was created, was more silly and over the top with its characters than the previous films in the series. What happened?

In The First Purge, following the decline of America, a new governing body has proposed The Purge, a 12-hour period where all crime is made legal. Caught in the middle of this first experiment are drug dealer D (Y'lan Noel), activist Nya (Lex Scott Davis) and her brother Isaiah (Joivan Wade) who are forced to survive the night.

The most interesting facet to me of The Purge franchise is the underlying sense that the government instituted the Purge to legally kill off the poorer members of society as a means of population control. Sadly, in this film, all of the intrigue is thrown out the window in the first half, showcasing the film's major problems: the script, and the acting.

While the original Purge film starring Ethan Hawke was a serious, relatively believable take on the premise, this film is tonally inconsistent. While the first 30 minutes of set up is serious and dramatic, the final hour devolves into a completely ridiculous, over the top action thriller complete with one-liners from our action star D. When the movie shifts to silly action, it actually becomes fairly enjoyable, but the wait is far too long. Dialogue is atrocious, particularly from government representative Patch Darragh and scientist Marisa Tomei. Tomei is way too strong an actress to be relegated to the schlock she is served.

The acting is all over the place in the film as well. A side antagonist "Skeletor" (Rotimi Paul) chews scenery left, right and centre. Noel captures the strong silent type well enough, but the character feels completely out of place against the rest of the characters. Davis is perhaps the strongest performance of the bunch, but even hers is up and down between terrified and badass. One stand out I will applaud is Mugga as Dolores, who embraces the ridiculousness of the script and provides genuine comic relief.

Technically, the film is pretty run of the mill. No piece of music stands out aside from the use of certain popular rap tracks, and the editing is complete with janky transitions that look like they were made in iMovie. Shot on a budget of $13 million, the final product shows that. Where Blumhouse has struck gold in the past with smaller horror films, The First Purge is too large a scale to have a such a small budget and work.

While the final action sequences are actually quite good, and the short run time breezes along, The First Purge is too inconsistent in its vision to be anything worth seeing. Another case in this series of great concept but poor execution. SKIP IT.