The Girl on the Train

Our most recent film only came out on DVD this week. It was based on a popular best-selling novel, which I had not read, and so we had a good audience for the screening, including several people we had not seen before.

While researching the film in order to write my notes I'd read the plot and so knew roughly what was going to happen. However the fragmented storyline muddied the water sufficiently to keep me on the edge of my seat. My only complaint was that one key flashback was subsequently (and crucially) proven not to have happened: thus I felt a bit cheated because of this.

Here are my notes:

The Girl On The Train

USA 2016                                111 minutes

Director:                                  Tate Taylor

Starring:                                    Emily Blunt, Rebecca Ferguson, Haley Bennett, Justin Theroux and Luke Evans

Awards and Nominations

• BAFTA Nomination for Best Actress (Emily Blunt)
• A further three wins and five nominations

“In the end, however, the whole movie rests upon the shoulders of Emily Blunt, and she holds it all together brilliantly, even as her character is falling apart. From the intimacy of My Summer of Love, through the “hangry” sorcerer’s apprentice of The Devil Wears Prada to the sci-fi action heroine of Edge of Tomorrow and the blindsided FBI agent in Sicario, Blunt has proved herself to be a mesmerising presence in a range of genres. In Rachel’s fractured personality, we see echoes of Blunt’s previous screen lives, refracted through a prism of self-destruction that somehow never alienates the audience. Retaining the British accent that makes her even more of an outsider in this scary New World, Blunt convinces completely as a drunken fish out of water. This train may not be bound for glory, but her disruptive company is worth the price of the ticket.”

Mark Kermode

Rachel Watson (Emily Blunt) becomes infatuated by the sight of a seemingly perfect couple visible from her daily commuter train. On one day she sees something that shocks her, and driven on by intrigue and obsession she starts to uncover the truth of what has happened.

The film is based on the best-selling thriller of the same name by Paula Hawkins, although for the purposes of the film the action has been relocated from London to New York. The conceit of the book echoes the classic Agatha Christie detective novel 4.50 from Paddington (filmed as Murder She Said (1961) with Margaret Rutherford playing Miss Marple for the first time), but the dark themes of the story in its cinematic version carry distinct echoes of the work of Hitchcock, especially in films such The Lady Vanishes (1938) and Rear Window (1954).

Emily Blunt began her career on the stage in the UK before moving into TV where she won an award for Most Promising Newcomer for her role in My Summer of Love (2004). She won a Golden Globe for Best Supporting Actress in the TV film Gideon’s Daughter (2006) and shortly afterwards made her Hollywood debut in the comedy The Devil Wears Prada (2006), for which she received both BAFTA and Golden Globe nominations for Best Supporting Actress. Since then she has demonstrated her versatility as a performer with roles in many different genres including historical drama (The Young Victoria (2009)), science fiction (The Adjustment Bureau (2011)), and a musical (Into The Woods (2014)). She is currently filming Mary Poppins Returns in which she has been cast in the title role.

Director Tate Taylor also began his career as an actor with roles for both TV and cinema before making his name as a director with The Help (2011) (for which he also wrote the screenplay). He followed this with Get On Up (2014) a biography of the musician James Brown and currently has various projects as director in development.

 

Here's the trailer:

 

 

The 20 Best Films of all Time chosen by me - Part 3

And now we move on to thrillers.  Once again this is my own selection, and the only criterion is that I have to have seen any film I nominate.

1. The Lady Vanishes
I read some time last year that you could not consider yourself a serious film fan unless you had seen The Lady Vanishes.  I'd read about it many times but had never seen it - at least no consciously.  Fortunately a quick internet order remedied the deficiency: I really enjoyed it and it has an amazing vitality that belies its 1938 release date.

2. The Long Good Friday
I'd been a fan of Helen Mirren ever since O Lucky Man - I'd even watched her on Jackanory reading a story in an amazingly low cut Jacobethen dress - but this was the first time I'd seen her in a role that did justice to her talent.  Bob Hoskins is pretty good too (understatement) and the whole film really caught the zeitgeist.

3. Casablanca
I'm not sure if this is a thriller or a lovely story, but who cares.  It's a film I could see forever, and it was the film that my wife and I went to on our first date: a double bill with Play It Again Sam. We'll always have Casablanca.

4. Fargo
In our film society we try t show the best of releases, but several years ago we made an exception for Fargo - still one of the best films in a very strong field from the Coen brothers.  since I'd first seen it I'd actually visited Minnesota several times for work and recognised the accent, but fortunately all my trips were in the Spring or the Autumn.  And now I even have my own wood chipper.

5. Chinatown
I first saw this in my first year at university when I suddenly became aware of the big world of films that opened up around me. It's a brilliant homage to Hollywood of the 1940s as well as a key film of the 1970s - and several of the characters play key roles in David Thomson's brilliantly unsettling novel Suspects.