Best known for graphic horror films such as Cabin Fever and Hostel, director Eli Roth opts for the sexual thriller genre with 2015’s Knock Knock. Work keeps Evan Webber (Keanu Reeves) home while his wife Karen (Ignacia Allamand) and kids Jake (Dan Baily) and Lisa (Megan Baily) head for a weekend at the beach.

As Evan toils at home, a torrential downpour hits and he gets visitors at his door. Genesis (Lorenza Izzo) and Bel (Ana de Armas) claim to be lost and in need of information. When Evan lets them in to use his computer, he finds himself stuck with more than he bargained for, as the young women boast ulterior motives.

“Dear Penthouse Forum: One day my wife and kids left town, so I stayed home alone for the weekend. I heard a knock and found two beautiful, scantily-clad babes on my doorstep. Soaked from a rainstorm, I invited them in to help – and you’ll never guess what happened next!”

When a movie feels like a set-up for the letter I imagined above, that’s not a good thing. Knock Knock doesn’t follow the tawdry scenario the stereotypical Penthouse Forum letter would take, but it seems just as cliché and far-fetched.

Boy, does Knock stretch reality to embrace its plot and concepts. There's not a subtle moment to be found, and that starts with our introduction to Evan and his family. It beats us over the head with themes and notions, and the tale never gets more three-dimensional from there.

As played by Reeves, Evan seems so detached from the notion of cheating that the scenes in which Genesis and Bel try to seduce him become odd and meandering. Evan seems barely aware of their flirtation most of the time, and even when he figures out the game being played, he remains doltish.

Boy, Evan really does come across like a dope! When the women arrive on his door, they offer such feeble excuses for their predicament that he seems stupid for accepting them, and he doesn’t get smarter from there. It’s patently obvious that they come with ulterior motives – why doesn’t he pick up on any of this?

Because then we wouldn’t get to watch the movie’s plodding, obvious thriller narrative. One idiotic moment follows another, and nothing believable crops up along the way. Instead, we’re stuck with relentless leaps of logic that require many ridiculous and moronic choices.

This becomes even worse because it wouldn’t have taken much to give Knock a better sense of reality. I get the feeling no one bothered to vet the script – they wrote one draft, declared it good enough and ran straight into production.

Not that I’m sure a better screenplay would’ve saved a project this misbegotten. Knock Knock aspires to give us tight, involving thriller, but instead, it ends up as ridiculous exercise in silliness.

Knock Knock appears in an aspect ratio of approximately 2.40:1 on this Blu-ray Disc. The movie came with an appealing presentation.

Sharpness seemed fine. A few slightly soft shots cropped up, but overall, I viewed a tight, distinctive image. No issues with jaggies or moiré effects occurred, and I witnessed no edge haloes. Print flaws failed to mar the presentation.

In terms of colors, Knock went with a green feel; a little orange showed up as well. The hues worked fine within those limitations. Blacks seemed deep enough, and shadows showed good smoothness. I felt pleased by this solid image.

The DTS-HD MA 5.1 soundtrack seemed acceptable but not especially ambitious. It used all the channels to give us music, and appropriate effects cropped up around the spectrum in a convincing manner. The rainstorm that prompts the movie’s action became the element that used the various channels in the most active/involving manner, but a few other minor tidbits popped up from the side and rear speakers.

Audio quality satisfied. Music was rich and warm, while speech came across as natural and distinctive. Effects seemed accurate and dynamic. Nothing about the mix dazzled, but it fit the narrative.

The Blu—ray boasts a few supplements, and we open with an audio commentary from co-writer/director Eli Roth, co-writer Nicolas Lopez and actors Lorenza Izzo and Colleen Camp. All four sit together for a running, screen-specific look at the project’s influences and inspirations, cast and performances, locations and sets, music, visual style, and related subjects. (Actor Aaron Burns also briefly chats via Face Time.)

At times, the commentary offers decent information, but it runs into one major problem: happy talk. Hoo boy, do all involved love this movie! They pour on the praise to such a remarkable degree that actual filmmaking notes often fall by the wayside. We still learn some useful tidbits, but it becomes tough to sit through all the back-patting to get to them.

Two Deleted Scenes follow. We see “Destruction” (3:15) and “Alternate Ending” (1:35). “Destruction” shows more of the rampage conducted by Bel and Genesis, while the “Ending” shows what Evan does after the theatrical version’s finale. The former just rambles, while the latter feels like a goofy twist. Neither one works.

We can view the deleted scenes with or without commentary from Roth. He tells us about the creation of the sequences and lets us know why he cut them. Roth offers some good notes.

The Art of Destruction: The Making of Knock Knock runs 14 minutes, 42 seconds and involves Roth, Izzo, Camp, Lopez, and actors Keanu Reeves and Ana de Armas. We get notes about the film’s origins and development, story/character areas, and the movie’s art. We find a decent array of notes, though many seem redundant after the commentary.

After this we find a Still Gallery. It offers 62 frames that mix shots from the set, promotional images and close-ups of props. This turns into a fairly nice collection.

The disc opens with ads for John Wick, The Last Exorcism, Cabin Fever, and the Saw series. No trailer for Knock Knock appears here.

With a slew of clichés and nary an intelligent moment to be found, Knock Knock delivers a brain-dead thriller. It requires so many leaps of logic to achieve its goals that it seems likely to leave the viewer exasperated. The Blu-ray presents positive picture and audio along with erratic supplements. One of the dumbest movies I’ve seen in a while, Knock Knock flops.