Grant continues his late career renaissance and gives an award worthy performance here, filled with his normal charm but corrupted, he's loquacious, petulant, frightening and absolutely captivating. He's able to really give some depth, nuance, and delight to this villain which in a normal genre piece doesn't necessarily get this kind of dimension. Both Thatcher and East also give great performances and have incredible chemistry primarily with each other but also as a unit in opposition to Grant. Thatcher brings a bit more edge and defiance, East brings more vulnerability and endurance together they just work great. Topher Grace pops up in a cameo but other than that the supporting cast is virtually nil.
Clearly shot on a budget(but not detracting from its effectiveness) almost exclusively in one location the film feels immersive, claustrophobic, and all the set dressing helps to evoke a kind of pan-religiousness as well as the house itself being labyrinthian furthering the themes. The sound design does in inordinate amount of work in ratcheting the tension(in a good way), its used a lot and in various subtle ways to elevate the mood, its nice to see this arm of the production which is usually under utilized get a fair amount of runway. There's also a focus on analogue tech(record and tape players, timers, keys etc.) which give this guy and this house texture.
The script is ambitious and complicated, thick with irony, metaphor, and commentary. The script and performances work in tandem for about the first half slowly and surely ratcheting up the tension and danger and tackling various ideas in a compelling way. It loses its footing in the back end, the script dipping below the quality of the performances, struggling to land the plane and kind of abandoning some of its richer ideas. Nevertheless its an ambitious, interesting piece of cinema.
Three great leads, a stupendous beginning leading to only a satisfactory end.
Currently in theaters.
See It.
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