Major spoilers ahead for Drop. You’ve been warned.
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If you ask Google for the definition of a thriller, it says, “A thriller is a genre of fiction, primarily focused on suspense and excitement, that aims to keep the reader or viewer on the edge of their seat.” So why does it seem like so many of the so-called thrillers that come out now can’t seem to do that one job? I would offer that it’s because modern filmmaking eschews so much of what makes the old classics work. But Drop attempts to take us back in time to the feel of an old-fashioned thriller. Does it succeed? Read on to find out.
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Drop opens with a woman, beaten and bloodied, crawling away from her attacker. The man kicks her as she tries uselessly to get away. The man, who’s ranting and raving, points a gun at her but then gives it to her, telling her to shoot him. He keeps screaming at her to do it as she holds the gun, her finger on the trigger.
Cut to sometime later, where the woman, Violet (Meghann Fahy), is counseling a fellow abuse victim (Stephanie Karam) over a video call. Violet leads her in an exercise that helps the woman overcome her feelings of worthlessness and fear. After she’s done on the call, a man (Ben Pelletier) knocks on the window, saying he’s there to read the meter. Violet tells him where to find it, not thinking anything of it. Violet’s also checking her phone, where she’s been messaging a guy named Henry (Brandon Sklenar), whom she’s supposed to meet for their first date.
Violet’s sister, Jen (Violett Beane), arrives to babysit her nephew, Toby (Jacob Robinson). This is going to be Violet’s first date since the death of her husband, Blake (Michael Shea). Jen helps Violet through her jitters, assuring her that the nightmarish experience she had with Blake isn’t going to happen again. Henry seems like a good guy, having waited three months to meet her.
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Jen convinces Violet to wear something a bit sexier than her usual work clothes and finally gets her out the door. When Violet shows up at the building where the restaurant is, she looks up at it and it seems like it’s a million feet tall. Then she’s stuck in an elevator with a lovey-dovey couple, making her even more uncomfortable.
She finally arrives at the top floor restaurant, Palate. She asks the hostess (Sarah McCormack) if she can wait at the bar since Henry texted that he’s running late. The entry to the restaurant is this weird tunnel that my husband said actually looked like a person’s soft palate – which is either really cool or a bit unsettling, depending on how you look at it, I guess. Personally, I thought it looked like the tunnel leading to the Wizard of Oz’s chamber, which is also cool and/or unsettling.
Anyway, Violet bumps into a guy (Travis Nelson), and then she orders a glass of wine from the bar. Then she’s approached by another older guy named Richard (Reed Diamond), who thinks she’s his blind date. They chat for a moment about how weird and nerve-racking dating is until his actual date (Fiona Browne) shows up. Violet feels badly for Richard when she sees the woman making an uncomfortable and disappointed face as they hug.
Then Violet gets hit on by the inebriated piano player (Ed Weeks). The helpful and sympathetic bartender, Cara (Gabrielle Ryan), tries shooing him away with another drink. The piano man asks Violet what she’d like to hear, and Violet jokingly asks for the theme from “Baby Shark.”
Cara apologizes for him as Violet gets a message coming from an app called DigiDROP. It’s a meme talking about this either being the best night of her life or the worst. The sender is known only as LetsPlay.
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Henry finally arrives, and they go to their table by the window. Violet has a fear of heights but agrees that the view of Chicago is amazing. Henry gives her a Blackhawks hockey puck as a present for Toby. Violet’s touched by the gift even though she says Toby will probably end up breaking a window with it.
Their server shows up, a super bubbly guy named Matt (Jeffery Self). He wastes no time launching into some improv before the hostess passes by and gives him the warning look. Matt makes a comment about them asking for that specific table, but Henry says he doesn’t remember mentioning that. They order more wine, and Violet continues to get more disturbing messages from LetsPlay. She shows the phone to Henry, and he figures it’s just somebody pranking her.
Henry tells her that the sender must be within 50 feet of her phone. So he checks out the place for her, but of course, everybody’s on their phones. He narrows it down to about six other phones – the most likely culprits being the high schoolers at another table celebrating their prom.
Violet tries ignoring her constantly buzzing phone. But when LetsPlay tells her to check her home security cameras, she’s horrified to see a masked man in her house with a gun. LetsPlay tells her that if she tells Henry or tries calling 911, they’ll know since her phone is cloned.
She goes to the restroom, and when the prom girls come in, she tries to get their help. But then LetsPlay messages that they can see her in there, too. She finds a bug in the planter and then asks what they want. They tell her to get the SD card out of the camera Henry has in his bag.
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Violet tries calling 911 from the hostess stand, but LetsPlay has the landline cut. Then when she goes back to the table, Violet sees there’s a bug there, too. She makes up a story to Henry that she lost her watch somewhere and asks Henry to go to the hostess and see if someone turned it in.
While he’s gone, Violet goes into his bag and gets the camera. She goes through the photos and sees that they’re all photos of the mayor with important people. She also sees photos of financial documents. Then she ejects the SD card and puts everything back as Henry returns.
LetsPlay tells her to go back to the bathroom. Violet makes the excuse that she thinks she might’ve left the watch there. When she gets there, LetsPlay tells her to smash the SD card, which she does. Then LetsPlay tells her to open the paper towel receptacle.
Violet finds a vial of liquid in it, and LetsPlay orders her to pour the contents into Henry’s drink. Violet says she can’t kill him, but LetsPlay says she’s done it before – flashing back to that fateful night with her husband.
She goes back to the restaurant and looks around, trying to figure out who LetsPlay is. The guy who bumped into her is just sitting alone, so Violet tries asking him some leading questions. But he just says he’s waiting for his sister to join him. Then Violet sees Richard and his blind date, who gets up in a huff and leaves, calling him a jerk.
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Violet goes back to the table and, in another desperate effort to foil LetsPlay, asks Henry if they can switch tables, mentioning her fear of heights. Henry’s like, sure, and they get Matt to move them. But then, of course, LetsPlay warns her that Toby’s dead if she leaves the original table. So then Violet looks like a crazy person suddenly changing her mind again.
Then the drunk Piano Man jokingly plays “Baby Shark” for Violet. Getting an idea, she writes “2 hostages” on a $20 bill and asks Matt to give it to him. When Piano Man takes a break to get yet another drink, he takes Violet’s $20 and goes to the bar.
Violet sees that Piano Man sees her message, and she thinks he’s getting help. But then he just gets another drink. And once he’s back at the piano having slugged his drink, he soon collapses.
While Henry runs over to help out, LetsPlay tells Violet that was a bad move. She checks the security cameras again and sees the masked guy punch out Jen. Then, he takes Toby up to his room and locks him in. When Henry returns, he says Piano Man seems like he’ll be okay.
But since Violet’s been acting so weird, Henry assumes that she really doesn’t want to be there with him. He says it’s okay, that he understands that she’s just not ready, and they should just try another time. Desperate, Violet kisses him to convince him to stay. She says they should do a couple of tequila shots and says she’ll go get them.
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When she goes to the bar, Cara asks how things are going. Violet just says she’s okay. At the table, Violet’s purse spills, and Henry sees the watch. When she gets back, she apologizes when Henry mentions the watch, making an excuse.
She asks Henry to get some limes for the shots, and when he leaves, she pours the vial into one of the glasses. When he comes back, Violet asks him why he picked her out of all the people on the dating app.
Henry says that he hates dating apps, that everyone just puts on a fake persona that they think other people want to see. But that Violet was different – she presented exactly who she was. Violet tells him how she failed to leave her abusive husband, how he would take her to a fancy restaurant as an apology for his terrible behavior.
They go to drink the shots – but of course, Violet can’t go through with it and spills wine on him. Henry leaves to go to the bathroom to clean up. LetsPlay messages that she made a bad move. She looks over toward the guy supposedly waiting for his sister – and then sees that the guy really was waiting for his sister, as she finally shows up.
Cara comes over to Violet and asks if she’s alright, saying she can tell when a woman needs to get out of a bad situation. Violet asks about the guy who was waiting for his sister. Cara says that they come in a lot but usually sit at a different table – the one Richard and his blind date were sitting at. Cara says that the blind date left because Richard’s been staring at Violet the whole time.
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Bingo. Violet grabs the tequila shots and goes over to Richard, confronting him. He admits to being LetsPlay and tells her to sit. Turns out he and the masked guy at her house have been hired to kill Henry, who’s going to be a witness in a case against the mayor.
Violet flashes back to that night with her husband, who was also pointing the gun at Toby. Turns out that Violet never pulled the trigger and that Blake grabbed the gun back and shot himself. Henry arrives at the table, suspicious. But Violet just says they were commiserating, and then they both drink the shots.
Satisfied, Richard enjoys his coffee and dessert – an excellent panna cotta, which Violet says was what Blake would order during those apology dinners. Then Richard suddenly realizes that Violet only pretended to spike the shot and dumped the drugs in his panna cotta while he was watching Henry drink.
Richard gets on the phone and tells the masked guy to kill Jen and Toby. Then he pulls out a gun and shoots. Henry takes the bullet for Violet, and chaos ensues as Richard goes on a rampage. Even poor Cara ends up getting stabbed (but she lives).
It looks like Violet’s done for, as Richard stands in front of the window that’s already been shot once. Violet grabs the hockey puck from her purse and throws it at Richard, hitting the cracked window. Just as Richard’s about to shoot her, the window shatters, and he goes flying out, falling to his death.
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Violet gets swept out as well, but she grabs onto a tablecloth. And just as it’s about to tear, Henry grabs her arm, pulling her back in. Henry gives her his car keys, and Violet then races through traffic to get home, where Jen’s fighting the masked guy.
Jen stabs him in the leg with a piece of broken mirror. Then she and Toby barricade themselves in his bedroom. Jen tells him to hide as Masked Guy breaks in and shoots her in the shoulder.
Violet arrives and fights Masked Guy, and she ends up in a similar situation like that fateful night with Blake. Masked Guy reveals himself to be the meter reader. But just as he’s about to kill her, Toby’s RC car pulls up beside her with now Unmasked Guy’s gun on it. She grabs it and shoots him. Toby’s fine, and Jen’s okay, too.
Cut to Henry in the hospital later on, watching the news detailing the elaborate murder plot and showing the mayor and some other guys getting arrested. Violet shows up with some food and milkshakes. Then she gets another drop on her phone. Uh-oh.
But it’s just Jen messing with her. She comes in to say hi with her arm in a sling. They all say hello, but then Violet basically tells her to go away. Henry then asks Violet what they should do for their next date, and she says it should be something – really boring. Henry wholeheartedly agrees, and they enjoy their milkshakes.
***
Christopher Landon has become one of my favorite writer/directors over the years. Ever since his work on Paranormal Activity: The Marked Ones (2014) to his work on the Happy Death Day (2017) flicks and most recently, Heart Eyes, Landon has shown a terrific ability to write and direct horror that also has a sense of fun.
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Now with Drop, he’s spreading his directorial wings to give us something much more subtle, elegant and truly Hitchcockian in the best way. Landon uses every tool in the filmmaking book to increase the suspense – everything from misdirection to how the drop messages are displayed, to how the shots are composed, homage classics like Vertigo (1958), Rear Window (1954) and North by Northwest (1959).
There’s one shot where Violet’s in the bathroom and the camera that’s looking down on her suddenly pulls way, way back, plunging her into darkness. It makes us feel the same dread, fear and helplessness as she does, in a beautifully old-fashioned way that’s never out of style. It’s also refreshing to see a flick that isn’t chopped up into an incomprehensible mess of half-second shots. Landon holds on performances and lets scenes breathe, something which many filmmakers could stand to learn.
The other important aspect that Landon handles well is giving the right parts to the right actors. Drop only works if Violet is someone we can empathize with, as there are only a handful of shots that she’s not in. Thankfully, Meghann Fahy proves herself more than up to the task, and her performance is top-notch throughout, which also speaks to Landon’s skillful direction. Brandon Sklenar also makes for a likeable and supportive companion to Violet’s heroine, making you root for them to get together despite the harrowing ordeal they go through.
This is not to say that Drop is completely flawless. Its plot is a bit on the ridiculous side, the kind of thing where if you think about it for more than a minute, it kinda falls apart and makes you think there must’ve been a simpler way to get rid of Henry. It also definitely pushes your level of tolerance for Violet’s actions to the limit – even though it’s not her fault. But overall, Drop is a terrific, solid thriller that actually does what it should – and keeps you on the edge of your seat.
Directed by: Christopher Landon
Written by: Jillian Jacobs, Christopher Roach
Release date: April 11, 2025
Rating: PG-13
Run time: 1hr, 35min
Distributor: Universal Pictures / Blumhouse
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