If you’ve ever fantasized about locking an obnoxious houseguest in your basement and letting karma do the rest, Intruders (2015) is your new therapy session. Directed by Adam Schindler and made for the kind of budget that wouldn’t cover one episode of Criminal Minds, this compact horror-thriller turns a routine “home invasion” premise into a symphony of vengeance, trauma, and DIY murder devices. Think Panic Room meets Misery, with a side of Dexter and a dash of HGTV if HGTV stood for Home Gore Television.
The Hermit of Horror
Our heroine, Anna (Beth Riesgraf), is not your average Final Girl. She’s agoraphobic, meaning she literally can’t step outside her house without having a panic attack — or in this film’s case, a good reason to kill someone. She’s spent a decade living in her childhood home, caring for her terminally ill brother Conrad, whose hobbies include dying slowly and hiding horrifying secrets in the basement. When Conrad finally kicks the bucket, Anna’s left alone with grief, trauma, and an unsettling amount of floor space.
But before you can say “emotional breakthrough,” three intruders arrive — Perry (Martin Starr), J.P. (Jack Kesy), and Vance (Joshua Mikel). They’re here to rob the place, because apparently crime movies have taught them that widows and shut-ins always have piles of cash lying around. Unfortunately for them, this shut-in’s got a basement full of fun surprises and a moral compass that spins like a slot machine.
When Robbers Pick the Wrong Zillow Listing
Most home-invasion thrillers rely on helpless victims — the terrified woman hiding in a closet while burly men stomp through the hallways. Intruders flips that on its head. Anna starts the film duct-taped to a couch, trembling in fear. Thirty minutes later, she’s the one doing the tying, trapping, and bludgeoning. Turns out she’s not so much a prisoner as she is the warden of her own personal hellhouse.
The robbers learn this the hard way when they chase her into the basement — where she literally retracts the staircase, trapping them inside like mice in a sadistic maze. It’s the kind of moment that makes you cheer and also question your morals. The film’s tone shifts from victim horror to predator satisfaction faster than you can say, “She’s got a hammer.”
It’s a gleeful inversion: instead of screaming and running, Anna calmly flicks switches and watches her tormentors panic. The house itself becomes a character — a decaying, booby-trapped monument to trauma and family secrets. If Martha Stewart designed a torture dungeon, it would look like this.
Beth Riesgraf: The Agoraphobic Avenger
Beth Riesgraf, best known for charming TV roles, delivers a performance so quietly intense it borders on hypnotic. She’s fragile and fierce in equal measure — a woman battling her own mind as much as her attackers. Every flicker of fear or rage feels earned, especially once the film reveals that Anna isn’t just afraid of the outside world; she’s also haunted by the sins committed inside her home.
When she flips from victim to hunter, Riesgraf plays it with chilling precision. She doesn’t suddenly morph into an action hero — she’s still trembling, still terrified — but there’s a cold logic behind her violence. She kills because she has to, because control is the only thing she’s got left. She’s basically the love child of Emily Dickinson and Jigsaw.
The Intruders Who Should Have Knocked
The trio of robbers are perfectly hateable, a collection of greasy greed and poor impulse control. Perry (Martin Starr, playing against type) is the ringleader — smug, cruel, and apparently allergic to good decisions. J.P. (Jack Kesy) and his brother Vance are the muscle, though one quickly becomes the meat. When Anna turns the tables, their overconfidence crumbles into delicious panic.
The beauty of Intruders lies in how these villains transform from predators to prey. One minute they’re sneering and threatening to burn her bird alive (they do), the next they’re weeping in the dark, realizing they’ve invaded a house that makes The Texas Chainsaw Massacre look like a bed-and-breakfast. Watching their power evaporate is the cinematic equivalent of pouring salt on a slug — cruel, messy, and immensely satisfying.
Welcome to the Basement of Doom
The film’s second half plays like Home Alone for the clinically damaged. The basement, revealed to be the domain of Anna’s late brother Conrad, isn’t just creepy — it’s a full-blown moral labyrinth. We learn that Conrad was a vigilante serial killer, luring child molesters into his home and “rehabilitating” them with industrial tools. Anna wasn’t just his caretaker; she was his silent witness, complicit in a twisted crusade against evil.
It’s an audacious reveal that could’ve derailed the story, but instead it gives the film real psychological bite. The horror isn’t just physical — it’s inherited, embedded in the walls. Anna’s home isn’t a prison; it’s a shrine to the family’s shared madness. You start to wonder whether her agoraphobia is psychological… or supernatural. Maybe she doesn’t want to leave because the house won’t let her.
And honestly, who can blame her? The basement has everything — hidden rooms, trap doors, cameras, power tools. If Airbnb offered a “Murder Dungeon” filter, this place would have five stars.
Rory Culkin: The World’s Most Unlucky Nice Guy
Rory Culkin (yes, one of those Culkins) plays Dan, the sweet, awkward food delivery guy who harbors a soft spot for Anna. He’s one of the few genuinely decent humans in the movie, which of course means he’s doomed to spend most of it bleeding, screaming, and regretting life choices.
Dan’s role adds a bittersweet edge to the chaos — he’s the outside world’s only link to Anna, and he screws it up in spectacular fashion. When it turns out he accidentally tipped off the robbers, she responds with the calm patience of a saint… who also happens to break his fingers.
Culkin’s bumbling sincerity contrasts beautifully with Anna’s cold detachment. Together, they form a kind of emotional Rorschach test: she’s trauma personified, and he’s the naïve conscience trying (and failing) to save her.
The Beauty of Brutality
At a brisk 90 minutes, Intruders wastes no time. The kills are quick, intimate, and grimly inventive. Director Adam Schindler knows when to cut away and when to make you squirm. The cinematography by Eric Leach bathes the house in gloomy amber light, like a tomb that’s been waiting for fresh corpses. Frederik Wiedmann’s score hums beneath the surface like a panic attack on strings.
But what really sells the film is its twisted sense of humor. There’s something perversely funny about watching hardened criminals realize they’ve broken into the home of a traumatized, weaponized recluse. Every scream echoes with irony. Every act of vengeance feels both justified and absurd. You almost want to root for the bear traps.
Burning Down the House
The finale brings everything full circle: Anna sets fire to her home, finally stepping outside for the first time in a decade. It’s both cathartic and tragic — she’s free, but only because she’s destroyed the one place that defined her. As she watches the flames consume her father’s sins and her brother’s crimes, you can’t help but admire the poetic insanity of it all.
Intruders doesn’t just end with a bang; it ends with a moral inferno.
Final Verdict: Lock the Doors and Enjoy
Intruders is that rare low-budget thriller that punches way above its weight class. It’s smart without being smug, gruesome without being gratuitous, and quietly hilarious in its mean streak. It takes the old “home invasion” template, flips it, folds it, and serves it back with a knife through the heart.
Beth Riesgraf gives a career-making performance, the direction is tight, and the script crackles with subversive energy. For a film made on less than two million bucks, it delivers more shocks, twists, and moral gray areas than most $50 million horror slogs.
It’s dark, twisted, and occasionally ridiculous — but in the best possible way. Because in the end, Intruders isn’t really about fear. It’s about control, survival, and the satisfaction of watching terrible people get what’s coming to them.
Rating: 4.5 panic attacks out of 5.
Home sweet homicide.
