THERE ARE SOME SPOILERS IN THIS REVIEW.
With the Golden Globes nominees announcement made few weeks back, I shall start off with reviewing one of the potential films foreseen to be nominated at Academy Awards next year... and that is Nocturnal Animals. Nocturnal Animals is a film directed and screenplay by Tom Ford who many years back debuted with his other film, A Single Man. Unlike A Single Man which tells a story of a man who was coping with his life after the death of his lover, Nocturnal Animals takes a turn on psychological love and how two characters cope with haunting, strange connection and existence with one another.
Starring Amy Adams and Jake Gyllenhaal in this neo-noir psychological thriller, the story tells a woman, Susan who is seemingly haunted by her estranged ex-husband, Edward's novel titled of the film name. In this film, we, as an audience member, is plunged into two worlds; one that is revolving around Susan and another revolving the characters in Edward's novel. In Edward's novel, Nocturnal Animals, the story revolves on a family who were on a vacation to somewhere when they were being stopped by a gang including a psychopathic charmer and leader, Ray (played by Aaron Taylor-Johnson).
Rocking back and forth between the real and fictional world, Nocturnal Animals offers a beautifully crafted and eerily tale of loss, grief and love. Between shots as the story progresses, by understanding Edward's novel, we can therefore deduced and analysed the relationship and characterisation of Susan and Edward. During the entire film, we noticed that Susan and Edward have difficulty in their marriage where their interests and personalities conflicted with each other, including to the point where Susan's mother (prior to being married) even said Edward was incapable and not worthy of her affections. It sure was devastating that Edward tried his best to fix the relationship and Susan getting involved with another man, Hutton whom she later married to (and sadly what goes around, comes around).
Nocturnal Animals is a novel, a message to Susan that how much she missed out when Edward disappeared completely from her life since she doubt him. It was a hahaha to the woman, indicating he was able to write a novel filled with raw emotions and dark content - showing his creativity and what he had been through during the separation and estrangement. With the ending that captures the regret and loss Susan faced in the restaurant, it felt like a sweet revenge for Edward and I truly agreed she should face this consequence, although it is upsetting that she was left alone in the restaurant, waiting for him to showed up.
In conclusion, Nocturnal Animals is a stylish thriller filled with captivating emotions, shots (thanks to Tom Ford's brilliant 'observant' directing) and even great acting provided by Jake Gyllenhaal. Although Taylor-Johnson's portrayal as Ray was indeed scary as a spot-on psychopath (even to the extent, well deserved nomination at next year's Golden Globes), I felt Gyllenhaal should actually be part of the nominees at Golden Globes for his portrayal as Edward and Tony brings out the emotions in the film and helping us to understand Susan as she read the manuscript and reminisced. If you happened to be finding a film to watch, Nocturnal Animals is one that shouldn't be missed, especially during the awards season.
Ratings: 7/10
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