Why John Krasinski Isn't a Surprising Director for A Quiet Place | Features

Though it was not seen by as many people as I imagine anyone involved with “Aloha” might have expected, the film provided a type of reboot of Krasinski’s film charisma, which would inform a project that lurked in his future, “A Quiet Place.” It introduced the world to a mature, muscular, brooding image of Krasinski, something that would be a prominent part of his lead casting in Michael Bay’s “13 Hours: The Secret Soldiers of Benghazi,” which uses his physical nature as much as his worried gazes (his co-star, James Badge Dale, is specifically far more talkative while Krasinski is contemplative). “Aloha” would also be echoed by Krasinski’s second attempt at feature directing, playing a new father in “The Hollars.” By the time Krasinski got to “A Quiet Place,” his filmography was pulsing with paternal machismo, and a desire to prove himself as an entertainer. 

This is to say that the emotional success of “A Quiet Place” is no fluke—Charlotte Bruus Christensen’s cinematography is exquisite, and Millicent Simmonds and Emily Blunt are wonderful—but it does come with perfect timing for Krasinski. It fulfills his celebrity magazine sensibilities about the importance of family, and his growing confidence as a director, allowing for visual storytelling that banks on vivid expressions from incredible actors like Blunt and Simmonds most of all. Age is a big benefit too, as his acting style has become more stoic as he gets more wrinkles on his forehead and weariness in his eyes, but it makes his calibrated expressions all the more immediate. Not for nothing, even the usage of sign language becomes a powerful outlet for a face like Krasinski's, given how it requires usage of eyebrows and eyes for emphasis in communication. It’s a filmmaking environment that he flourishes in, albeit working from a story where you don’t have to know where his character came from, or even his name. He only wants you to recognize that it’s him, acting opposite the superstar Emily Blunt. 

“A Quiet Place” is the kind of story you could imagine previous Krasinski characters surviving in, but it’s the Krasinski idea of silence that works within the storytelling itself. With this script co-written by Scott Beck and Bryan Woods, Krasinski has created this obstacle course of silence, with dread that can consume your imagination, as it slams against the anxiety that something might happen to the protagonists in a world where sound equals death. At the same time, the silence is alienating, heightening the emotional moments when characters can steal moments of spoken word (as when he does with his son, or with his wife). Just as Krasinski was able to get audiences to build a connection to audiences relating to his wordless facial expressions in previous comedies, he now uses that silence as an instrument building dread and/or emotion out of a head space you share with his characters. 

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