Once you’re in her world, you can’t get out.
Thomasin McKenzie has proven herself to be a fine young actress with such classic films as “Leave No Trace,” “The Power of the Dog,” “Jojo Rabbit,” and “Last Night in Soho.” Her latest movie “Eileen” plays like a film noir spiked with coming-of-age behaviors and twisted natures. And she also has a certain chemistry with co-star Anne Hathaway.
This movie also happens to be the 41-year-old actress’ most riveting role since “Colossal.” I didn’t like her in “The Witches” or “The Hustle” or “Serenity,” or “Armageddon Time” or more recently in “She Came to Me.” But in “Eileen,” she acts like she lives in the 1960s. In fact, this movie takes place during it.
McKenzie plays the title character, who works as a secretary at the local juvenile detention center, and comes home dealing with her drunken ex-cop of a father (Shea Whigham), who wave his gun around the neighborhood at night. She’s at a certain point in her life when she puts snow in her privates and imagines getting it on with the prison’s security guard Randy (Owen Teague), all out of arousal. Even her bosses think she’s a waste of time, but she knows how to use her words like a woman. And even imagines using her old man’s gun to kill him or herself, which really shocks the audience and then reassured everything’s okay.
Or is it?
Hathaway co-stars as Rebecca, the new prison psychologist, who becomes a greater interest to Eileen. Notice her introduction with her blonde hair and cigarette like she’s in a film noir, and listen to the guys at the local bar asking her if she’s been in the movies, and how she responds: “I work in the boys prison.” And see how she slow dances with Eileen there, while punching a sexist trying to hit on her.
We see Rebecca less at work, because her methods have made her bosses make her leave and come back after the holidays. She’s trying to figure out the root of how young Lee Polk (Sam Nivola) murdered his father in bed, next to his mother (Marin Ireland). But we see more of how she draws Eileen into her world. She refuses to have roommates or anyone in her life, which means she can do whatever she wants without anyone telling her otherwise. Which means she can show Eileen something dangerous. Something that really tests our senses, and has us at the edge of our seats.
The location, of course, is the winter of Massachusetts, which sets the mood and tone of the film, especially for its choice of characters and dialogue. And it’s all beautifully photographed by cinematographer Ari Wagner (“The Power of the Dog,” “Lady MacBeth”) and timely composed by Arcade Fire’s Richard Reed Parry. Director William Oldroyd (in his first movie since “Lady MacBeth”) draws various lines between what is moral and what is immoral. It can all be handled ingeniously and provocatively.
“Eileen,” based on Ottessa Moshfegh’s novel with the screenplay aided by Luke Goebel (“Causeway”), has only a few moments that are uncalled for (some I can’t really spoil for you), but most of the movie is damn entertaining. McKenzie and Hathaway are both well-cast in their respective roles, while Whigham has the right age as the drunken father and Ireland gives a powerful monologue, which you need to hear to believe. All these actors are quite transcending as the movie takes various turns within the genres. What sinister act is happening? Where is it going? And what will be the outcome? All I can say is it will have you thinking and thinking and really possessed by it.
And about this movie acting like a 60s film, even the end credits want to have that kind of style. But I don’t praise movies of its kind for just how they open and close them; I praise them for what stories and character development unfolds, and it couldn’t be more thought-provoking and old-fashioned.
In Select Theaters This Friday
Expands December 8
