Editor’s note: The views and opinions expressed in this review are solely those of Marlon Wallace and do not necessarily reflect the views and opinions of WBOC.
The directorial debut of Graham Moore feels like an aesthetic or spiritual sequel to The Imitation Game. Moore won the Oscar for Best Adapted Screenplay for The Imitation Game (2014). That film was about a man living in London, England, in the 1950’s talking about his time in the war helping to defeat the Nazis or the bad guys. This film is about a man from London in the same time period also talking about his time in the war and how he ultimately defeats some bad guys. Moore is making a film that on its surface feels like The Imitation Game. The tone is similar. Even some of the art direction and costumes feel similar. Unlike his Oscar-winning film though, this one could be more classified as a thriller. It could also be deemed as a potboiler, leaning a bit away from prestige and more into popcorn entertainment. It doesn’t lean too far out of prestige. It still has that air of respectability, particularly through its production design. This is perhaps Moore doing something more akin to Alfred Hitchcock.
Mark Rylance (The Trial of the Chicago 7 and Bridge of Spies) stars as Leonard Burling, an Englishman who currently lives in Chicago, 1956. He has his own tailor shop, a corner store in the city. Yet, he doesn’t like to be called a tailor. He instead refers to himself as a bespoke cutter who specifically provides men’s fashion, particularly men’s suit jackets. He has a series of clients that keep him busy, but he also has something else that occupies some of his mind space. In the back of his shop, there is a lock box. It looks like a tiny mailbox. Every now and then, men drop off envelopes into this lock box. These men are involved or part of the local mafia. The lock box is a way for them to make payments or correspondence. It’s not clear.
Zoey Deutch (Zombieland: Double Tap and Before I Fall) co-stars as Mable Shaun, the young woman who works at the tailor shop as either a receptionist or secretary. She likes Leonard, but she dreams of leaving Chicago and traveling the world, seeing London and Paris, as well as other places across the globe. Leonard worries about her because she’s dating one of the men who visits that lock box and who is clearly involved with the local mafia, a young gangster in fact.
Dylan O’Brien (Teen Wolf and The Maze Runner) plays Richie Boyle, Mable’s boyfriend. He’s the son of a gangster and is jockeying to have a more important role in his father’s organization. He comes across as a bit of a caricature from a 1930’s gangster flick, but, he’s definitely a hothead, trying to prove himself. One way to do that is figure out who’s the rat. Someone has been leaking information about Richie’s family to the FBI and others. Richie wants to figure out who it is and stop them.
Johnny Flynn (Stardust and Beast) also co-stars as Francis, a member of the Boyle crime family. He’s not related by blood but he’s become an important figure. He’s perhaps a type of enforcer. He’s pretty high up and takes orders directly from the head of the Boyle family who is Richie’s father. Yet, Francis mainly works side-by-side with Richie for collection of things in the lock box. He believes that he has proof of who the rat is and wants to use that proof to his advantage.
Much like Hitchcock’s Rope (1948), the film takes place all in one location and mainly occurs all in one evening. Yes, there’s this plot involving who the rat is that is an undercurrent but that becomes background and forgettable. Rope didn’t have mafia intrigue. It was a simple story about two people trying to cover up a murder, literally hiding a corpse in plain sight with the dramatic tension being having guests come to the scene of the crime without knowing that it’s the scene of the crime and wondering if the people who arrive will discover that they’re in a crime scene. Moore’s film basically becomes this exact same thing, even with two people here hiding a corpse in the same place as the two people in Rope.
The major difference is that in Rope the goal is to have the guests visiting realize or figure out that a crime has been committed and for the culprits to face justice. Here, Moore’s film manages to make the goal one of the guests visiting not to realize or figure out that a crime has been committed. It’s also the case that one is perhaps not sure what to feel for the culprits and facing justice might not be what one might expect. Rylance’s performance is certainly the most outstanding as one comes to see how precise and detailed a man his character actually is. It’s also curious to see his shifting loyalties as this film is as much a survival film that’s more about matching wits and outsmarting people than it is about using physical violence. Moore’s film does devolve to such physical violence, which Hitchcock’s film never did.
Rated R for bloody violence and language.
Running Time: 1 hr. and 45 mins.
In theaters.
