User Reviews

The premise is intriguing: a British thriller that begins with a social angle and soon ventures into darker territory. From the start, it seems to want to be more than simple entertainment, with nods to class tensions and a rebellious youth pushing back against the **** problem is that the idea never fully takes shape. The narrative shifts perspectives often, which gives it some unpredictability, but also makes the tension weaken and disperse. At times it feels more concerned with opening new subplots than with exploring the potential of the main one.Hugh Bonneville is, without doubt, the highlight. His turn as a menacing figure is disturbing and provides the spark the story needs. Around him, the rest of the cast does its job, though none leave the same impression.Visually, it’s well put together, with a grey, oppressive atmosphere that suits the tone. Yet it lacks the punch for the suspense to truly resonate. It always feels one step away from going further.Overall, it’s an entertaining thriller, with some effective moments and a solid idea at its core, but it never quite takes off. A decent way to pass the time, though unlikely to linger once the credits roll.

Dreadful, hammy dialogue. Unlikeable protagonists. Wooly motive for the bad guy. All in, a thoroughly tedious slog that robbed me of nearly two hours. I have absolutely no idea why critics are praising this amateurish, flavourless tripe.

Perhaps this film is not the Rock of Gibraltar of the genre, what is certain is that it handles suspense in such a way that it keeps us glued to our seats until the last minute. And what about Hugh Bonneville (Downton Abbey) in an inconceivable role.

Unnecessarily dark and at points poorly acted. The premise is good. I didn't like any of the characters and the friend of the main character was unbelievably dense.

There is a market for low-budget movies like this thriller, but you need to add something crunchy to the mix to make it stand out, such as a well-written script, an original take, tense dialogue, interesting characters, and good pacing. I pick these examples on purpose because the movie is devoid of them. The basic story is so mundane that it baffles the mind. This script must have landed on someone's desk, and that someone must have given it the green light. I can only assume that there was some mistake with the original good script, and the wrong one was given the go-ahead. Or is Netflix's plight so dire that they can only get the mediocre ones? In my mind, I see Netflix canvassing the universities for graduates hoping they get lucky. Perhaps they were inspired by Stalin's remark that quantity has a quality of its own. And to drive the point home: there is nothing remarkable here, even though there could have been if the makers had just changed some parameters. One thing to take at heart is to invest in the protagonist and not swap him out halfway into the movie with another one. Or perhaps you could have considered making someone else the protagonist, like the mother. This would have created an interesting angle: the mother must learn from her son. Another piece of advice is that less is more. If you don't have the budget, why establish multiple protagonists? I go as far as that there are three. The worse aspect is that the movie feels overlong because it spends so much time on their backgrounds. And this would be fine if this was a social drama, but it isn't: it's a thriller. A thriller has the protagonist, the underdog, pitted against the superior antagonist, and the movie ends with their roles being reversed in a clever or unusual way. The film goes through the ropes but is never clever or unusual. Now to give you an example of what could have been done. The antagonist could be exposed by streaming the whole on the internet. This could have been foreshadowed by the son filming his break-ins and publishing them on the internet. Instead of the son, the mum will be the story's primary focus. Her son breaks into the antagonist's house and disappears. She has to find out what happens and then is up against the seemingly unassailable antagonist. And with the help of her son's friend, she chips away at the antagonist until he crumbles and falls. A few points. 1 There is one protagonist and it will be the mother. 2 What happens inside the mansion will be unclear until the end. There is footage, but it is distorted or unusable. This adds to the mystery. This is the old wisdom of not exposing the monster until the end. I would have omitted every scene inside the house. Instead, what happens in that house is something the mum observes from the outside. She calls the cops. They go in and come out. What has happened? She asks the cops; they tell her they didn't find anything. She learns that the antagonist is best buddies with the police chief. The low point for the mum would be that the antagonist uses his influence and connections to set the whole apparatus of law enforcement on her(including perhaps making her out to be a nutcase), which makes the antagonist untouchable and powerful. 3 The parent-child relation gets swapped. The son becomes his mother's teacher. 4 I would make the son become the father instead of the other guy(actually, I think he should be given a small role or be left out entirely). This creates conflict with the mother(you, dad? You can't even hold a job down for more than a week?) and perhaps with his pregnant girlfriend. (You have to stop these break-ins, you get to be a father now). 5 The mum is not tech savvy, but she learns from her son about making movies by watching and learning from his films. This can then be used to make her understand her son more. (For instance, he makes money and has a large following, so while he doesn't hold on to a regular job, he has one: being a streamer). 6 The antagonist gets exposed through his security system. These are just some ideas I came up with in an hour, and in my opinion, it would have led to a better script.

Netflix may be selling this ''suspense'' to its most simplistic audience, sorry if that sounds arrogant, but for me it was almost a mockery of how lousy I thought it was. I even felt my intelligence insulted when George MacKay's character dies because of how stupid it turned out to be, especially because of how the story gets lost after that occurrence. I Came By is simply another throwaway from their catalog.

Alfred Hitchcock style movie. I absolutely loved the plot and the writing.

[SPOILER ALERT: This review contains spoilers.]

(Mauro Lanari) "Desperately seeking a screenplayer" is not a quote from the title of Susan Seidelman's '85 film. After Netflix, the other streaming platforms and film production companies have also stopped looking for a creative who knew how to propose original stories or who did not stuff them with characters with zero psychological dimension and with the most moronic behaviors conceivable. A thriller constructed in this way is not in "Hitchockian style" but beyond any level of suspension of disbelief.

The movie def. got my attention for the whole time. Story is not new or innovative, but still exciting. Some mistakes regarding the logic / stupid behaviour of the persons.

George MacKay plays a graffiti artist who breaks into the homes of London's elite and sprays the movie's title on their walls to let them know they're vulnerable. His visit to the home of a prominent judge (Hugh Bonneville) turns horribly dark. The thriller elements are parceled out slowly, which matches the gradual development of the story. While it never becomes truly tense, the plotting has some unusual elements that give it extra integrity (no spoilers here). After his role as the stuffy patriarch in Downton Abbey, it's fun to see Bonneville be so mean and cool at the same time. This is not a great thriller, but enjoyable for his performance and the unusual take on the subject.

So painful to watch. This could have been a great film, the premise is good, but it’s let down by thoroughly unlikeable protagonists and such heavy handed politics (although I did find it fairly amusing that the hyper-woke, right on, graffiti artist protagonist is a misogynist who abuses his mother).