Nightmare Alley

Guillermo del Toro writes and directs his first film since the Oscar winning, The Shape Of Water, with this dark twisting adaptation of William Lindsey Gresham’s novel. Bradley Cooper is Stanton Carlisle, who we meet setting fire to a house, he then moves on coming across a travelling carnival, a show full of Human curiousities, non more so than Clem Hoatley’s (Willem Dafoe) “geek” show. Carlisle is a grifter an ambitious conman who falls for Rooney Mara’s electric girl, Molly. He sees her as his future with their own act. We find them two years later, with their successful act delivering them a lifestyle and money. However, when they come across Dr. Lilith Ritter (Cate Blanchett) their lives change with new opportunities, but opportunities at a high cost

This is a wonderfully dark journey an intriguing winding story that twists and turns from start to finish. As you expect Del Toro builds an engrossing world, full of complex characters. Set in the 1940’s we get the full noir feel of the period. Dark corners, half lit faces and art deco buildings.

Cooper does the heavy lifting and his natural charm helps him carry off a likeable version of an unlikeable character, as he negotiates Carlisle’s falls and rises. But it is the supporting ensemble who add so much, Mara and Defoe, Toni Collette, David Strathairn and Richard Jenkins’s Ezra Grindle. But it is Blanchett’s femme fatale doctor who shines the most.

At 2hr30 the film has to engage and it did. I found it completely absorbing and while it twists and turns those turns are signposted, with Del Toro shunning cheap tricks and “out of nowhere” surprises.

I doubt it will be for everyone, but it was for me. I loved the world that the film inhabited and the intriguing nature of the story and the journey it goes on. It’s absorbing and dark, visceral at times all of which had me hooked from start to finish.

A deliciously dark, intriguing tale, that keeps you absorbed from start to finish. If you want dark and intriguing then this is the alley to head down.