Never meet your idols, or in this case, never watch a movie about your idols. I think A Talent for Murder is probably a great example of how we can scour the diaries of famous artists, writers, historians, politicians, and so on, looking for some of the more contentious figures to bring to the screen, revealing to the world just what kind of people they really were. Even if they weren’t necessarily public figures who demanded attention, especially those who passed away before the rise of social media, a lot of their personal viewpoints managed to get swept under many a rug. A Talent for Murder is going to make Patricia Highsmith fans weep. Turns out, the author of The Talented Mr. Ripley was a bit of a garbage human being. The good news here is that Helen Mirren has agreed to step in and provide a very eloquent performance that complements a person who need not be complimented. While A Talent for Murder is a work of fiction, the characterization of Highsmith draws from her actual diaries, so when you hear her saying some particularly unpleasant things about certain groups of people, understand that you can rather easily do your own research and discover just how she actually felt about certain races and ethnicities. This isn’t simply a screenwriter trying to make a famous author seem more controversial than she really was.
A Talent for Murder made its way through the fall festival circuit before Bleecker Street decided to bring it to audiences. It’s a mystery of sorts, which, given the fact that Patricia Highsmith was a mystery author, shouldn’t be particularly surprising. It’s also something of a chamber piece, with the source material being a stage play, and much of the film retaining that theatrical quality. Most of the action takes place inside Highsmith’s home, with Helen Mirren spending nearly the entire duration of the film opposite Alden Ehrenreich, who plays a young aspiring author sent by her publisher to convince her to write one final Tom Ripley novel and close out the series. She wants absolutely nothing to do with the idea, and she wants even less to do with him. However, he’s not simply some lackey sent to complete an assignment. He’s a genuine admirer of her work, claiming that she can give him practically any line from any of her books, and he’ll be able to tell her exactly where it came from. He’s certainly done his homework, even if that doesn’t particularly impress the notoriously difficult author.
After spending much of the first act slowly sparring with each other, the two eventually develop a tenuous working arrangement, with Highsmith challenging him to come up with an idea for the final Ripley novel. A killer idea, you might say. This is juxtaposed with sequences that bring a more cinematic quality to the story, as the film occasionally leaves the confines of Highsmith’s home to visualize the fictional murder mystery they’re developing. The third major player here is Olivia Cooke, who plays a young woman Ehrenreich’s character meets on a train and develops something of a crush on. However, she’s also utilized in the fictional sequences that accompany the writing process, allowing the film to play with the relationship between the story being written and the world in which these characters actually exist. It’s an interesting way of opening up what might otherwise have been a fairly straightforward adaptation of a stage play, even if the film never entirely escapes those theatrical roots.
Everything else is potentially a spoiler, and given the fact that I actually liked A Talent for Murder more as it went along, including the ending, I don’t particularly want to ruin the experience by leading anyone in a specific direction. Personally, I watch too many damn movies, because there was a point fairly early on where I started developing an inkling of where this particular story was headed, and it turned out that I was right. However, I also appreciate that the film doesn’t necessarily set its conclusion in stone, leaving just enough room for audiences to arrive at their own interpretation of what they’ve witnessed. There’s certainly a heavily implied explanation, and I suspect most audiences will arrive at roughly the same conclusion, but I appreciate a mystery that’s willing to trust its audience rather than spend its final ten minutes explaining every little detail. Sometimes the most interesting thing a film can do is leave you with a question that lingers after the credits have rolled.
Helen Mirren is absolutely stunning as Patricia Highsmith. It’s difficult to say whether this is one of her best performances, simply because she has delivered so many excellent performances throughout her career that this feels like yet another addition to a rather extraordinary body of work. Mirren has reached that point where audiences almost take her talent for granted. We expect her to be excellent, and when she is, we simply shrug our shoulders and move along to the next performance. I realize that the Oscar race is particularly crowded this year, but at the bare minimum, when people start discussing which actresses deserve to be in contention, Helen Mirren should be part of that conversation. Sometimes, when actresses who have been consistently excellent for decades deliver another terrific performance in a smaller film that isn’t necessarily going to light up the box office, we tend to toss that achievement aside in favor of someone with a flashier campaign or a more commercially successful movie. In this case, that would be downright rude to Helen Mirren, who is phenomenal here. She manages to make Highsmith fascinating without ever asking us to forgive her, and that’s a rather difficult balancing act when you’re portraying someone who could be so thoroughly unpleasant.
I’ve never been particularly enthusiastic about Alden Ehrenreich, but I will give him credit for holding his own opposite Mirren, which is no small accomplishment. Their performances depend heavily on the verbal sparring between their characters, and Ehrenreich gradually becomes more interesting as the film begins revealing additional layers to the relationship. Olivia Cooke has less to work with, particularly because her appearances serve a very specific function within the narrative, but she makes the most of her limited opportunities. Ultimately, this is Mirren’s film, and everyone else is orbiting around her performance. A Talent for Murder also requires a certain amount of patience. If you’re somebody who absolutely hates chamber pieces, films with limited casts, or stories that spend an enormous amount of time in one location, this probably isn’t going to work for you. The first act is particularly dependent on dialogue, and audiences looking for a more conventional murder mystery may find themselves wondering when the actual mystery is going to begin. However, for those who appreciate this type of filmmaking, there’s something rather enjoyable about watching two characters attempt to outmaneuver each other through conversation, particularly when one of those characters is played by Helen Mirren.
What ultimately makes A Talent for Murder worthwhile is that it manages to become more interesting the longer it goes on, rewarding the patience it demands during its opening act. It certainly isn’t reinventing the mystery genre, and I wouldn’t necessarily suggest that its final revelations are going to leave seasoned moviegoers completely stunned. However, there’s something satisfying about watching a film gradually reveal what it’s actually been doing all along, particularly when those revelations encourage you to reconsider some of the conversations that came before. There’s also a rather appropriate irony in taking a writer who became famous for creating one of literature’s most fascinating and morally questionable characters and placing her inside a mystery where she may not be the smartest person in the room. A Talent for Murder is an acquired taste, and certainly not a film that’s going to appeal to everyone, but I found myself increasingly invested in where it was headed. And if nothing else, it serves as another reminder that Helen Mirren remains one of the finest actresses working today, even when the character she’s playing is someone you probably wouldn’t want to spend five minutes with in real life.
Fresh: 7.0/10
