While it has a sound concept, Breaking In is a thriller with no thrills and has characters that are painfully annoying and dumb. It constantly tries to set up surprises but lets the plot drag in the process.

After her father dies, Shaun Russell (Gabrielle Union) brings her children (Ajiona Alexus, Seth Carr) to his residence for the weekend so that she can start to sell the house. Once she arrives, she realizes that the house has intense and technologically advanced security measures to keep people out and protect something within. This attracts the likes of an intelligent robber (Billy Burke) and his crew as they break into the house to steal from a safe hidden somewhere in the house. But once they take her kids hostage, Russell must take matters into her own and take these criminals down before they harm her kids.

Honestly, the first act of this movie is pretty solid. Viewers get a small sense of Union’s likable personality from the start and the interesting premise that the film centers on. However, once the criminals break in, it all starts to go downhill.

While it is interesting to see that Union’s character doesn’t fall into the tropes of home invasion movies, with the protagonist has some kind of military or fighting experience, it does make some sequences feel a little less real. It is something that takes viewers out of what is happening and while Union’s motivation is strong, it never feels like enough to take out some criminals without much issue.

Breaking In really lacks any tense moments that is usually found within the genre. Often times, scenes are put to slow motion or have dramatic music to attempt to add tenseness to the scene. However, these scenes often just make scenes take longer and add nothing at all anyway. Also the PG-13 rating and lack of blood takes away from the stakes and harm that could add to the drama of the film.

The film’s antagonists are also quite annoying as they are just tropes with painful dialogue. They never really accomplish anything in the film and audiences might even feel that it makes no sense that they are working together at all. They make dumb choices that make them really un-intimidating foes and make Union’s actions feel less important and easy.

Breaking In tries its best to reach a decent run-time, but ultimately drags itself to get there. There are many moments where the movie could have reached an okay conclusion, but instead audiences will feel bored by the time the film decides to end.

While Union shows that she can be a tough leading lady and definitely deserves another chance, Breaking In is just plain boring and doesn’t capitalize on the interesting premise it tries to set up.