Producers: Bruce Cohen, Tiffany Persons, Garret Levitz, Zoë Kravitz and Channing Tatum Director: Zoë Kravitz Screenplay: Zoë Kravitz and E.T. Feigenbaum Cast: Naomi Ackie, Channing Tatum, Christian Slater, Simon Rex, Adria Arjona, Kyle MacLachlan, Haley Joel Osment, Geena Davis, Alia Shawkat, Trew Mullen, Liz Caribel, Cris Costa and María Elena Olivares Distributor: Amazon MGM Studios
Grade: C-
Even if you absolutely agree with the point it’s making, you might loathe the way Zoë Kravitz’s film makes it. “Blink Twice” is a thoroughly unpleasant treatment of what might be called the post-#metoo world, in which punishing the wrongdoers is often replaced by an injunction to forgive those who apologize for what they did and try to forget their misdeeds. Its message is that you shouldn’t be too quick to trust the sincerity of those who say they’re sorry, or to ignore what they did.
Case in point: Slater King (Channing Tatum), a wealthy tech mogul who’s admitted his past misconduct (unspecified) and apologized publicly and profusely. He’s done all the right things—going into therapy, stepping aside from his business, correcting his attitude and making amends with philanthropic activity. The last is clearly center stage at the lavish gala he throws to invite other mandarins to donate to the charities he sponsors.
Among those on the staff at the affair is beautiful cocktail waitress Frida (Naomi Ackie), who’s obsessed with meeting Slater. She and her ditzy BFF Jess (Alia Shawkat) replace their service duds with glamorous gowns and make their way into the party as guests, and Frida manages to meet the host “cute” by slipping and falling, prompting him to come to her rescue. He’s instantly smitten and invites her to join a group he’s taking to his private island for a getaway. She’s overjoyed, and Jess tags along, a bit less enthusiastic. But what follows is hardly “Pretty Woman” redux; its obvious inspiration is “Get Out.”
The island proves a paradise with an unsettling vibe—an isolated enclave of wealth and privilege where the select few are clothed in white gowns, coddled in private rooms and served specially designed dinners prepared by gourmet Cody (Simon Rex), accompanied by unusual drinks capped with raspberries. Over the varied courses Frida jousts for Slater’s attention with another of the guests, Sarah (Adria Arjona), a gorgeous TV reality show star. Silent, vacantly smiling servants are the waiters.
There are other beautiful women around the table, too, eye-candy Heather (Trew Mullen) and Camilla (Liz Caribel), with Jess a less glamorous fifth. In addition to Slater and Cody, the men are a regular group at these gatherings: Vic (Christian Slater), a leering type always quick with a camera; Tom (Haley Joel Osment), an over-the-hill, drugged-out actor; and Lucas (Levon Hawke), a blandly vacuous but handsome cryptocurrency mogul. Always lurking in the background are Slater’s blusteringly overbearing assistant Stacy (Geena Davis) and his security muscleman Stan (Cris Costa). There’s also a strange, beaming maid (Maria Elena Olivares), whose incoherent babblings confuse Frida and, it appears, is collecting venom from the large snakes that roam about the compound.
Not present but memorable from his presence at the gala is Rich (Kyle MacLachlan), Slater’s smoothly sinister therapist who seems to have something to do with what’s going on.
The situation on the island grows increasingly strange and menacing. Frida begins to suffer from shards of memory—presented in edgy collages edited by Kathryn J. Schubert—that suggest torture and abuse. And she has unexplained injuries. Even weirder, Jess disappears and there’s no evidence that she was ever there—no one else recalls her at all. What’s happening?
The movie explains that, and resolves it in a particularly (and protractedly) lurid fashion. “Blink Twice” turns into a full-fledged horror movie in which the monsters have human faces and their victims must resort to equally violent means to save themselves. It ends up an extremely ugly movie that clothes the ugliness in a veneer of privilege and luxury, as well as blood and the satisfaction of seeing justice done.
From a purely cinematic perspective, however, it’s quite accomplished. The cast is strong. One might quarrel with Frida’s choices—she’s actually an extraordinarily naïve woman whose obsession with glamour and success is the cause of her misfortune (and that of her best friend), but Ackie almost makes you understand her, and morphs into an avenging angel with impressive power. Arjona, initially presented as a sexy rival, manages a similar transition with nearly equal punch. Tatum uses his image as an irresistible hunk to invest Slater with a charisma that conceals dark impulses, and his brood of followers—Christian Slater, Rex, Hawke, Osment—all succeed in making your skin crawl, though in different ways. Davis is especially memorable as Slater’s unctuous publicity-spinning enabler.
Technically, too, there’s much to admire, with Roberto Bonelli’s production design and Kiersten Hargroder’s costumes creating an atmosphere of ostentatiously oblivious bad taste. The intoxicatingly overripe images of Adam Newport-Berra’s cinematography and Schubert’s swooning editing add to the entrancingly awful ambience, as does Chanda Dancy’s deceptively elegant, and by the close threatening, score.
To recur to its theme, you might be able to forgive Kravitz for “Blink Twice,” but you might find it difficult to forget the unsavory experience it affords. The female guests in the movie are constantly being asked “Are you having a good time?” If the same query is posed to viewers, many are likely to say no.