Movie Review: Girl On The Train

Genre Thriller
Director Tate Taylor
Actors Emily Blunt, Justin Theroux, Hailey Bennet.
Reviewed on Cinema (2D)
Air Date 2016-10-07

Mount Tuesday

Published October 7, 2016

What unfolds is a bourgeois soap opera of sorts; the blonde on the balcony is the troubled nanny of Rachel’s former husband (Justin Theroux). The agenda’s, which unmask itself, makes for detailed suspense all nestled between a wintery upstate New York backdrop.

As the novel, Girl On The Train is a murder mystery cocktailed in a plot, consisting of everything from pregnancy, addiction and further taboo behavior. Few characters the plot spirals between are all connected but have no idea that they are. It’s a bit like Zodiac and a lot like Gone Girl.

I fear the thing with Adaptations is, it’s largely make or break business. Director Tate Taylor opts for broody tone and plenty of flashbacks; which can drive you if interested, but an adaptation this huge (given that the novel was also a best-seller) would have fared better given a Stanley Kubrick treatment. Characters arrive on-screen with very little back-story, and so making it difficult to connect relation or sympathy towards them.

Emily Blunt does great playing a nocturnal alcohol addict; with the ensemble providing strong acting chops in chorus. Girl On The Train is not an entirely bad film; it’s just a seriously dull one.

Having recently hit rock bottom, Rachel (Emily Watson) catches the train each day to New York pretending to be en-route to a position she has been fired from for more than a year. Sat at the window of her Manhattan bound train, our commuter lays eyes on what appears to be a normal couple at first. Rachel speedily fixates on a young blonde named Megan Hipwell (Hayley Bennet) who is seen standing on her balcony kissing a certain someone. Jaded and vodka-drenched, Rachel has to rely on her own dodgy memory to try and piece together what she saw. What unfolds is a bourgeois soap opera of sorts; the blonde on the balcony is the troubled nanny of Rachel’s former husband (Justin Theroux). The agenda’s, which unmask itself, makes for detailed suspense all nestled between a wintery upstate New York backdrop. As the novel, Girl On The Train is a murder mystery cocktailed in a plot, consisting of everything from pregnancy, addiction and further taboo behavior. Few characters the plot spirals between are all connected but have no idea that they are. It’s a bit like Zodiac and a lot like Gone Girl. I fear the thing with Adaptations is, it’s largely make or break business. Director Tate Taylor opts for broody tone and plenty of flashbacks; which can drive you if interested, but an adaptation this huge (given that the novel was also a best-seller) would have fared better given a Stanley Kubrick treatment. Characters arrive on-screen with very little back-story, and so making it difficult to connect relation or sympathy towards them. Emily Blunt does great playing a nocturnal alcohol addict; with the ensemble providing strong acting chops in chorus. Girl On The Train is not an entirely bad film; it’s just a seriously dull one. [taq_review]

Movie Review: Girl On The Train

2016-10-07

Mount Tuesday

Pretentious thrills offers a mostly forgettable film.

Total - 2.8

2.8

Sometimes dark, sometimes dreadful. Girl On The Train is a difficult film to sit through mainly due do its bland subject matter and puzzled storytelling. Fans of the book may enjoy this.

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