Margaret is an early 40’s, executive – who has a rigid, controlled life. She lives in a spotless apartment with her daughter Abby, who is about to turn 18.
One day at a conference she sees a man from her past that unravels her.
David, the much older man who she lived with as an 18 year old herself. The man who changed her past completely. But why is he back?
Direction
Quite decent camera work from Andrew Semans, who also wrote the screenplay. There is an impressive 8 minute long monologue from Hall – which is more on her talent than the director.
To date this is his second and only feature film.
Cast/Characters
Rebecca Hall is brilliant as Margaret. Her almost polished perfect life is taken away from her with David’s arrival, and her decent into chaos is nothing short of incredible. Her 8 minute monologue (I’ll discuss the events in moment) is extraordinary. Hall also executive produced the film.
Tim Roth plays David, who returns to Margaret’s life after 20+ years. He is fantastic as the sadistic, without being physical intrusion in her life.
Grace Kaufman is also great as Abby, who watches her mother descend into almost madness.
Breakdown
Unfortunately despite the way the film was advertised in the trailers, the end result did not come up to par.
The film tried to be two genres, psychological thriller, and body horror. The first part it did well – with Margaret clearly suffering an almost nervous breakdown at the return of the man who psychologically tortured her as a child of 18.
It is what he “did” – or claims to have done (eaten their child), and have the child ‘still with him’ which is where this lost me. This all culminates in a bloody finale, where Margaret kills David with a knife, and cuts the baby still intact and alive out of him, and then cuts to a “happy ever after”
However…
This is an ambiguous ending – to which my ending is that David was never there, he was a hallucination, and Margaret may have killed ‘someone’ and is now in an asylum in the final shots (which is all white, and the final moment we see her drop her happy expression and gasp in fear.
Not having the ambiguous ending would have served the narrative so much better, because the screenplay is trying to be too clever, but sadly its not.
Margaret is also not seen to be a empathetic protagonist either. Her parenting is questionable as She would rather have an affair with her subordinate, while her daughter is in hospital), give her daughter hard liquor as well. Her professional life is also poor, having the affair with Peter, and then there is that monologue about her past with David to poor Gwyn!
There are also a few moments that are mentioned that either don’t make sense, or are never brought up again like the tooth Abby tells Margaret she finds in her wallet (and the nonchalance from both of them, and also some moments in Margaret’s monologue (22 years ago her parents were hippies… which was in… the year 2000???)
Score/Soundtrack
I did love the score by Jim Williams (no relation as far as I can tell to the other J Williams composer)
Overall
Too many downs. Despite impressive performances, a nice looking film, and solid score, this one is a fail, and not a recommend.
You can catch more of my discussion on this on my Podcast, link below.
1.5/5
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