STRANGE DARLING (2024) - a spoiler-free review of an eminently spoilable film
An attempt to recommend/critique JT Mollner's tricksy pulp thriller without giving anything away.
“Here kitty, kitty, kitty…”
Before seeing Strange Darling, Willa Fitzgerald was best known to me for having played Meg March in the BBC’s 2017 miniseries adaptation of Little Women, and for playing Jack Reacher’s season-long sidekick/love interest, Roscoe, in season one of Reacher.
But after seeing Strange Darling, you better believe this is the real-deal star-making role that ought to firmly put her on everybody’s radar with a quickness, because Jesus H. Tap-Dancing Sarah Christ! This is one of the greatest performances of the year, and yet you just know it’s going to go criminally underrated and under-seen by the wider moviegoing public, by virtue of the film’s niche cult appeal, queasy-bordering-on-taboo subject matter, and the fact you can’t talk about any part of the film’s plot - neither in specifics or allusions - without inadvertently giving away the various surprises that going in blind would yield.
All you need to know is that the plot is wild; the non-linear structure is ingenious; the 35mm film cinematography by Giovanni Ribisi (yes, that Giovanni Ribisi) is gorgeously sumptuous and floridly vibrant, especially on the big screen, its quality thankfully exceeding the slightly self-important act of brazenly opening the movie with a title card announcing it was “SHOT ENTIRELY ON 35MM FILM”; the folksy acoustic original/cover songs by Z Berg are beautifully soothing, while the brash soundscapes of Craig DeLeon’s score are complimentarily unnerving; and of course, both the modern-day scream king Kyle Gallner, and the revelatory Willa Fitzgerald, anchor the movie’s big swings with their electrifying performances you can never once take your eyes off of, as you try to figure each of the characters out.
It’s unquestionable that writer/director JT Mollner will piss some people off with Strange Darling, and they won’t necessarily even be wrong to be pissed off, as it’s easy to see how the film could be taken as… reactionary, I guess you could say. There’s a bit of an S. Craig Zahler vibe one might feel about the provocations made, though I reckon that’s perhaps a bit too strong to level at Strange Darling, particularly if one were to compare it to something like Zahler’s Dragged Across Concrete, which often felt like it deliberately wanted to reach out through the screen, and sneer troll-like in people’s faces if they got offended by the self-consciously transgressive opinions it may or may not have even believed in.
By contrast, Strange Darling is more of a straight-down-the-line pulpy potboiler that wants to throw you for a hell of a loop, but still provide you with a thrilling good time at the movies, and an experience you won’t soon forget.
That’s about the extent of what I can go into before I start wading into dreaded spoiler territory, so whenever and wherever you can watch the film, see Strange Darling for yourself, and determine your own opinions.
(Oh, and make sure to stick around past the end credits, won’t you? There isn’t a post-credits scene per say, and it’s not integral to the story or anything, but there is something there to be found for those with the patience to wait for it… or, since the film’s likely to be in the realm of home viewing any day now, then those with the ability to fast-forward to the very end, and hear what awaits…)
Thank you for giving this film more exposure. I’m still disappointed it didn’t get the love at the box office it deserved.