Breaking In
follows the story of the Russell family in the days following the death of
Shaun’s (Gabrielle Union) father. Shaun and her father have a fractured
relationship, mostly due to his shady dealings that she wanted no part of.
Shaun is in charge of her father’s estate and takes her two children, Jasmine
(Ajiona Alexus) and Glover (Seth Carr), to his giant lake house on Lake
Constance, Wisconsin for the weekend. Shaun was planning on going through her
father’s belongings and getting the house ready to put on the market. The house
is massive and has state of the art security throughout including cameras in
every room, motion sensors, and retractable bullet proof siding. The house is a
fortress, but who was her father protecting himself from? As
soon as Shaun gets to the house, memories of her childhood begin flooding back,
but she doesn’t have time to reminisce – a group of men show up and let
themselves in.
Eddie (Billy Burke) is the leader of the group. He is
calculated and the most intelligent of the men. There is Duncan (Richard
Cabral) – a loose cannon that is clearly a handful to control, and Sam (Levi
Meaden) – who is incredibly uncomfortable with the idea of causing any harm to
Shaun and her family, he only wants to get what they came for and get out. Shaun’s father has something hidden in the
house that the men are after, and the pesky Russell family is not supposed to
be at the house to get in their way. The men take Shaun’s children hostage and
due to some unfortunate circumstances, Shaun is locked out of the house and she
finds herself…breaking in. Shaun must pull out all the stops to try and save her family and
make sure they all make it through the night.
Breaking In wastes
no time getting into the action. Eddie and his men show up very early on to
begin their torment of Shaun and her family. The film plays off of the fears
that many have. Intruders coming into your home, your safe place, and you are
helpless to stop them. The film flips the script on this with Shaun being
anything but helpless. Even though the odds seemed stacked against her – outnumbered,
with no training, and no weapons – Shaun won’t let that stop her from doing all
she can to rescue her kids. Breaking In
is chock full of inconsistencies and is very formulaic, but is a decent action
movie. Don’t bother spending big bucks on it in the theaters, but keep it in
mind for a future red box rental or Netflix viewing – I wouldn’t want you
missing all of the smoldering looks Gabrielle Union drops throughout.
Rating: 2 out of 5
