The story is simple, the acting is very average, except for Taylor Russell. There is good suspense and adequate thrill. A great movie for munching on popcorn and passing the time.

ESCAPE ROOM is a generic kind of thriller that trades on the newfound popularity of thriller experiences, in which a group of friends willingly allow themselves to be locked in escape rooms before solving puzzles to facilitate their escape. A real-life CRYSTAL MAZE, if you will. I've seen a previous and very similar B-movie that wasn't very good, but this one is more mainstream and bigger budgeted, so there's more emphasis on effects. I found it quite similar to that '90s cult classic CUBE, although of course nowhere near as good, lacking as it does interesting characters and only tending to generate a minimum of suspense despite all the screaming and shouting.

Six strangers are given mystery boxes that invite them to win $10k. Each one arrive at an office building. As they wait in a room, they find the door locked with the heat rising. They struggle to escape and find themselves trapped in a series of elaborate rooms.

This reminds me of Cube. At least in that one, the movie doesn't waste time introducing the characters. The opening foreshadowing sequence reveals almost everything. I kept waiting for a surprise reveal that the other competitors were not actually killed. Maybe they deliberately did not show a irrevocable death on screen to highlight a red herring. I don't care about these people. They are annoying. Everybody has a rude comment or a sly joke. The group dynamics could work with one jerk but almost everybody seems to have a jerk mode. They need to chill. As for the room designs, they are the most appealing aspect of the movie. They are fascinating although the clues are basically random. In Cube, there is actually something to solve. In this one, there isn't much to solve. I also hate that the players don't try to bring useful items from one room to another. It's rather unrealistic that everybody walks out of the cabin into the woods without grabbing a blanket or rug. At the very least, someone would brace the door open. The room designs are inventive and pretty fun. That keeps my interest until the end.