The Girl on the Train (2016)

Genre

Drama | Mystery | Thriller

Director

Tate Taylor

Country

USA

Cast

Emily Blunt, Rebecca Ferguson, Haley Bennett, Justin Theroux, Luke Evans, Allison Janney, Edgar Ramirez, Lisa Kudrow, Laura Prepon, Darren Goldstein

Storyline

Divorcee Rachel Watson (Emily Blunt) takes the train in to work in New York every day, and as the train passes by her old house, she starts watching the couple, Megan (Haley Bennett) and Scott Hipwell (Luke Evans), living a few houses down  and creates a dream life from them. Then one day Megan goes missing, and Rachel becomes invested in the case and tries to find out what happened.

Opinion

Just like I said I would, I bought Paula Hawkins's novel and read it. So then, just like I said I would, I watched "The Girl on the Train", not expecting a lot from it because of the reviews I had read. Somehow this film managed to be even worse than I thought it could as it turned out to be a boring and depressing mess.

I should probably mention that I loved the novel, but I'm still having a hard time believing there's people who enjoyed this film. It is a practical joke. The tense, interesting, gripping story that made Paul Hawkins famous worldwide just isn't here. The story delivered by Tate Taylor is a complete mess, dragged on and on, with no tension whatsoever and plot twists that are so confused and almost incomprehensible.

Some changes have been made from the book that frankly I didn't understand. For example, the film rushes to get Megan into therapy to discuss her problems, but her mysterious past only emerges in the final part. Why did they need to rush it then? And why is Dr. Kamal Abdic hispanic instead of Bosniac? If you want to change the nationality it's okay with me, but at least have the decency to change the name.

And that brings me to the next point, the characters. They are truly awful. They have no characterization, no backstory. They are basically as flat as a table. Rachel is hardly the portrait of alcoholism, Anna isn't even a character and so is Tom - and considering the role he has into the story, the screenwriter should have focused a bit more on him.

On one thing, however, the film exceeds the book. While failing on every other front, Tate Taylor was able to shift between the characters in a quite graceful manner, definitely better than how Hawkins handled it in the book.

Unfortunately that's it with the good things about this film. Okay, maybe Emily Blunt does a fine job as Rachel, but she is left alone to save this film. The rest of the cast is useless. And I wonder if Haley Bennett's direction was to look as much as possible like Jennifer Lawrence in "Silver Linings Playbook", she practically looks like her twin.