The Gift (Joel Edgerton)

[Henry Gale]

IMDb / Wiki

[Henry Gale]

This is pretttttaaayyy fucking good. A bit on the predictable side after a certain point if you rightfully take every offhand detail as important like I happened to, but the rest of it is so well-crafted, viscerally gripping and mentally unsettling that it's hard to fault it for going exactly as it does, expected in broad strokes or not.

Edgerton does all of his jobs very well. Quietly great supporting cast too - Allison Tollman, Busy Philipps, Wendell Pierce for one scene as a cop that definitely isn't Bunk or the cop he was when he met Jason Bateman in Horrible Bosses.

It wasn't quite on the level of an out-of-nowhere surprise something like The Guest was for me last year, but its status is similarly low-key to impress without prior expectations, and it'll leave its own unique impression on me. (A fantastically uneasy one at that.) It steers so much more intelligently than where the suggested conventional modern thriller version of this (which is even implied through the vibe of the marketing materials I've seen) would be inclined to go. It is perfectly current in its visual and sound designs, but beautiful classical in its very psychologically-troubling-leaning storytelling sensibilities, and that's how it thrives.

I wish there were more big spectacle movies this summer to look forward to (Rogue Nation can take us out on a high note!), but I'll absolutely take something like this to sneak up on me every week instead. Just no-frills, fucked-up fun.

[Mal]

Yuppie fear films <3
Edgerton's direction sure doesn't feel like this is his first film- solid, well crafted and mature storytelling makes this film excell in a genre that is usually littered with cliches. It would make a perfect double feature companion with One Hour Photo.