Strange Darling, 2023.
Directed by JT Mollner.
Starring Willa Fitzgerald, Kyle Gallner, Ed Begley Jr., Bianca A. Santos, Barbara Hershey, and Madisen Beaty.
SYNOPSIS:
A one-night stand sex game spirals out of control into a violent murder spree.
Strange Darling begins with a narration – by The Lost Boys and Terrifier 3 star Jason Patric, no less – informing us about a real-life serial killer and the nature of the crimes committed. We are also informed that the movie we are about to watch was filmed in 35mm, which tells you that the filmmakers care about presentation and are probably movie geeks. Once the movie starts, we are dropped straight into chapter three of a six-chapter, non-linear narrative – remind you of another filmmaking movie geek fond of non-linear structures and ultraviolence?
Yes, the influence of Quentin Tarantino looms large over Strange Darling, a movie that veers dangerously close to style-over-substance but is saved from that particular strand of modern filmmaking by two very strong central performances and a sense of intrigue that draws you in because, quite frankly, you want to know how these two people got to be in the situation they are in.
And with that, you cannot really go into any plot details about this movie because to do so would spoil the whole experience. Chapter three opens the movie and shows us an injured lady (Willa Fitzgerald) being pursued by a coked-up man wielding a rifle (Kyle Gallner) through the US backwoods. Straight away this gives us a perception of events, and so director JT Mollner is quick to skip chapters and show us how this situation began, which is with the two said people meeting up at a motel for a one-night stand.
Which is all you can really know going in, because there are filmmaking tricks aplenty to keep things spicy, although the seasoned genre fans amongst you will probably figure it out long before JT Mollner intends you to, which is where the movie gets close to style-over-substance because it doesn’t really employ anything original in the way it plays out, but it does look and sound fantastic doing it.
Kyle Gallner and Willa Fitzgerald have a smouldering intensity in their performances – when they are on-screen together and when they are separate – that you feel there could have been a little bit more done to give us something other than the surface-level action that plays out throughout the story. More backstory? Maybe. A little bit of a history of the serial killer or maybe a bit about their previous crimes? Possibly, although you cannot help but think that JT Mollner isn’t really interested in that much depth and just wants to get to the ultraviolence. Again, remind you of anybody?
Regardless of its narrative shortcomings, Strange Darling is still a gripping and visually striking movie that hits all the right beats and keeps things moving along at a decent clip for the most part, as it does not end as strongly as it began, meandering to a close that doesn’t really answer anything. The true crime nature of the premise gets a bit lost as the game of cat-and-mouse draws to an end, and although the obvious Brian De Palma-worship that comes into play during a key scene is there for a narrative reason, it does feel a little out of place and forced, like it was written into the script before the actual plot detail it is there to highlight.
Nevertheless, when taken at face value, Strange Darling is a dark thriller that draws from many sources of inspiration and mixes them up to create something tense and, for the most part, enjoyable.
Flickering Myth Rating – Film: ★ ★ ★ / Movie: ★ ★ ★
Chris Ward
