This movie is based on the fastest-selling adult novel in publishing history, so chances are good you’ve read the book. Still, you should see the movie.
See “The Girl on the Train” for the direction, the writing, the performances, the way everything is staged and put together.
Even if you think you know “who dun it,” it wouldn’t be the first time a movie turned out differently from the book.
The story is this: Every day, as Rachel (Emily Blunt) rides the train to and from New York City, she watches a young couple and imagines a love story for them.
One day, she’s shocked by what she sees. And then the woman— Megan (Haley Bennett)—goes missing.
What happened—and why? And who was responsible? Every one of the major characters seems to have a reason for wanting her dead.
Start with Rachel, who has imagined killing Megan for betraying her fantasies. But Rachel is an alcoholic who can’t remember where she was when Megan died.
Or perhaps it was Megan’s husband, Scott (Luke Evans), who may not be as loving as he seems. Or her psychiatrist (Edgar Ramirez). She’s shared a lot of secrets with him.
Tom (Justin Theroux) and/ or his wife, Anna (Rebecca Ferguson), may also have motives; Megan suddenly quit being their nanny, leaving them angry and stranded.
Or was it the man on the train (Darren Goldstein) who was in the tunnel the night Megan died?
Director Tate Taylor (“The Help,” “Get on Up”) stocks the film with a whole school of red herrings and keeps moving the bait around. He tells his story through the bloodshot eyes and muddled mind of Rachel, who is angry, confused and unreliable.
The screenplay by Erin Cressida Wilson gives the director a lot to work with. She’s turned the interior dialogue of the book into back stories that provide motives and scenes that build potentially dangerous relationships.
As the focus shifts from character to character and we jump backward and forward through time, the plot deepens.
Cinematographer Charlotte Bruss Christensen finds endlessly interesting ways to shoot Rachel on the train; Taylor knows how much train footage we really need to see.
The film’s male characters lack differentiation; they all have roughly the same traits and personalities, each a bit despicable in roughly the same ways.
The real strength of the movie comes from each of the three main actresses finding her character’s flawed center. Taylor knows how to direct women to superior performances.
As the jealous and manipulative mother who needs a nanny so she can spend her days shopping, Ferguson plays Anna as a spoiled woman seething inside. When reality comes visiting, we’re not sure which side she’ll be on.
Bennett’s Megan is both pitiful and pitiable. She knows what she has, what she wants and what she’s lost. And it’s that combination that gets her in trouble.
But Blunt is the superstar here and she makes Rachel a woman of slurred words, shifting moods and eyes that reveal the confused mind of someone struggling to find self-absolution for sins she may or may not have committed.
Unfortunately, Taylor spends too much time watching Rachel drinking and wandering around feverishly. The movie slows down and sometimes sags as a result.
While the tone is necessarily dark, even a few lighter moments would have added a sense of pace.
But Taylor does lay out the plot comprehensibly, carefully peeling back the layers in ways that are surprising but logical.
The movie is well constructed, even though its third act feels overstocked with plot points. There’s a lot to reveal for a sensible conclusion.
This is a thriller that may not have you on the edge of your seat, but it will keep you wondering: What really happened to the woman whose perfect life was imagined by the girl on the train?
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