Blumhouse has firmly established itself as one of the most consistent hit factories in Hollywood, with the production company churning out a succession of horror movies that can always be relied on to make money and frighten the life out of audiences, regardless of what critics think. The fails hit harder when you become accustomed to winning, though, so You Should Have Left must have stung for everyone involved given that it wasted a heap of top-notch talent.
Written and directed by Jurassic Park, Spider-Man, Mission: Impossible scribe, and all-round Steven Spielberg favorite David Koepp, Kevin Bacon headlined the sparse cast as a retired banker going through a midlife crisis of sorts, who was accused but never convicted of murdering his first wife.
Now married to a much younger woman (Amanda Seyfried), the couple and their young daughter relocate to an isolated rural home for a head-clearing vacation. This being a psychological tale of spooky things going bump in the night, of course, there may be something evil lurking within the walls that plans to ensure they won’t make it out alive.
A formulaic haunted house setup for sure, but the execution was even more lacking. While a 40 percent Rotten Tomatoes score isn’t exactly out of the ordinary for a $4 million genre flick, the 24 percent user rating most definitely is – especially with the reliably popular Blumhouse at the helm.
Make no mistake about it, then, You Should Have Left is as dull as dishwater, but the unyielding popularity of horror has seen it rebound on streaming. As per FlixPatrol, the instantly forgotten chiller has become a Top 10 hit in multiple nations, proving that the Blumhouse branding remains as bulletproof as ever.
