Directed By Zoe Kravitz

Starring – Channing Tatum, Naomi Ackie, Alia Shawkat

The Plot – When tech billionaire Slater King (Tatum) meets cocktail waitress Frida (Ackie) at his fundraising gala, sparks fly. He invites her to join him and his friends on a dream vacation on his private island. It’s paradise. Wild nights blend into sun-soaked days and everyone’s having a great time. Nobody wants this trip to end, but as strange things start to happen, Frida begins to question her reality. Something is wrong with this place. She’ll have to uncover the truth if she wants to make it out of this party alive.

Rated R for strong violent content, sexual assault, drug use and adult language throughout, and some sexual references.

BLINK TWICE | Official Trailer (youtube.com)

POSITIVES

Meaningful horror grows from the seeds of a simplistic concept into something profoundly provocative, and in the case of ‘Blink Twice’, it begins as an isolated survive-the-night slasher, before evolving into a thoroughly compelling social commentary on class warfare, suppressed trauma, and male gaslighting that results in a film that is every bit shocking as it is entertaining. Part of that entertainment factor in extravagance belongs to Kravitz, who in her first delve behind the lens captures a consistency to tone that not only caters to the exaggerated and over-the-top realities of such a lifestyle, but simultaneously also an aforementioned seclusion factor in the dynamic of two lower class friends throwing caution to the wind in order to spend a weekend with strangers, which maintains emphasis in the creep factor that persists just below the surface of many stuffily uncomfortable exchanges. Kravitz revels in such a dreaded disposition, continuously trusting her production with intentionally displacing editing and one stingingly scintillating score from Chanda Dancy, which both inspire such an overwhelming and empathetic helplessness to the characters, despite the surprising intelligence of Frida, and while Kravitz’ execution during the climax does leave slightly more to be desired, she competently understands how to sell the compelling factors of ambiguity, which faithfully maintained my interests throughout a 103 minute run time, all the while conjuring plenty of unsettling imagery in distorted vantage points and blurry cinematography that drove the anxiety in so much atmospheric awkwardness between its characters. On the subject of Dancy’s compositions, repetition certainly plays a prominent role in driving the psychologies of the film’s many dynamics, with many of her tones eliciting the same four opening notes that could easily sound identical to the untrained ear, but in the same manner that these scenes and conflicts grow and expand from their initial discomfort, so too does the composer’s expansion to instrumentals, crafting a false sense of security in the expectation of familiarity, which is often ratcheted intensely in deviation to mirror and accompany the uncovered realities of what’s taking shape with the corresponding imagery. Likewise, the character dynamics and conversations charm with naturalism and lived-in believability to their exploits, which leave it effortless to engage and indulge upon personal conflicts that, in the case of the rich, most of us will never experience. Similar to Quentin Tarantino, Kravitz and her co-writer E.T Feigenbaum, ground the conversations into such a rhythmic balance between those involved that generates an effortless appeal of chemistry to the interpretation, and particularly in the case of Frida and her best friend (Played by Shawkat), garners much of the caustically comedic muscle for the film that keeps the engagement hip and approachable, resulting in a twisted element of dark humor that compliments the horror exceptionally, especially when the proverbial shit hits the fan during the film’s climactic final twenty minutes. While I have some issues with this section of the film that I will get to later, I can say that the film’s unpredictability factor is certainly there, and I see there being no sort of way how anyone could accurately predict or foresee the kind of dark corridors that this film capably travels. Lastly, ‘Blink Twice’ serves as a coming out party for Naomi Ackie, who in the overwhelming task of sharing the screen with some of the biggest names in Hollywood, knocks it out of the park with a three-dimensional turn as the film’s protagonist that will undoubtedly put her among the most badass female heroines of all-time. Ackie seamlessly musters the panic and vulnerability that stem from such an indescribable situation of consequential helplessness, with facial registries deserving of the close-up treatment, but for my money it’s her stoicism and sense of awareness that are most definitive, traditionally allowing her to escape the helpless victim trope that female protagonists are unfortunately saddled with in these kind of movies, while cinematically stealing the spotlight and refusing to ever give it back. While that spotlight does shine brightest for Ackie, noteworthy turns from Tatum and ‘Hit-Man’s’ Adria Arjoni helps her shoulder the burden of responsibility, with the former eliciting the movie’s greatest transformation, while the latter gives into an unforeseen sinister side from a character so rich that his detachment from society and consequences make him one dangerous adversary.

NEGATIVES

For about the first 80 minutes of ‘Blink Twice’, it had the ability of being one of my favorite horror films of the year, but unfortunately it becomes overwhelmed by some of its choices during the movie’s third act, which left me with a bit of a bad taste during my final impressions of the experience. Without spoiling anything, I can say that the big reveal does involve a bit more of a suspension of disbelief than I care to require, and while I am all for an exaggerated execution manifesting something surreal or subconsciously, Kravitz doesn’t explain some of the key ingredients to such a psychological conflict, all the while rushing its development in ways that make the movie feel like it ran out of time, instead of satisfyingly resolved what was uncovered. Considering it takes eighty minutes before the physicality of this conflict comes to fruition, it leaves little time to explore the compartmentalized dynamics of this overwhelming truth, and soon enough Kravitz is left to not only dispose of a remarkable amount of characters, while also tying the film in a bow that serves as the exclamation point to everything her audience previously experienced. In short, she doesn’t, as the film’s final scene toes the line of fantasy a bit too heavily to feel believable, especially with an unforeseen element of hypocrisy that defeats everything about greed and power roles for genders that the film was orchestrating throughout the entirety of its engagement. In addition to a flawed and underwhelming ending, my only other legitimate gripe towards the film is in the lack of usage of some of its star-studded ensemble, with some characters receiving a single scene of characterization, while others never even move into focus. You could honestly make the case for anyone other than Ackie or Tatum, for the lack of focus game, but mostly I had a lot of unanswered questions pertaining to Christian Slater, Geena Davis, Kyle McLachlan and Simon Rex’s respective characters, who never attain significance in both the depth of their respective portrayals, or impact to the integrity of the story’s foundation, to be used as anything other than friendly favors to Kravitz. Anybody could’ve portrayed these characters, so it’s clear that they were merely used to beef up a poster, and in that regard it’s a bit manipulative for someone like me, who loves the hell out of Slater or McLachlan, and is given so little to satisfyingly bask in.

OVERALL
‘Blink Twice’ is an atmospherically and tonal triumph for Zoe Kravitz, whose first delve in the director’s chair elicits an anxiously stirring dissection into class warfare and traumatic suppression so scintillatingly nightmarish that it effortlessly evokes the horror elements of a weekend island getaway gone bad. Though Ackie and Tatum follow their director’s leads with dazzling performances, and the film is able to maintain an unpredictability factor to the air of its ambiguous direction, a flatlining final act and absent supporting characterization leave this vacation nearly stranded by the weight of its baggage on board, but still one that rides the waves of turbulence to excitement and energy of a new voice in the second act of her cinematic career.

My Grade: 7/10 or B-