The Girl on the Train (2016)

Written by Filipe Manuel Neto on October 6, 2023

A very feminine film with a good mystery, but is no better due to several small problems and the total absence of dramatic tension.

Good books usually give rise to good films… if they have people who are skilled enough to translate them intelligently onto the screen. I heard great things about the original book, but as I never found it on sale in my language, I ended up never being able to read it. All I can do is talk strictly about the film, and overall I was satisfied.

I couldn't help but feel that the film took a while to really capture attention: I think it was only twenty minutes after the beginning that I felt that there was something interesting here. However, I can understand the need to clearly introduce the three central female characters in the plot. I also liked seeing the way the script treated the main character: the film starts with her, and she seems like someone very friendly. Little by little, this changes: the character is confronted by others and reacts in unfriendly, abrupt or thoughtless ways (I'm being nice). After all, she is the villain! Only very close to the end, with the clarification of the plot after new twists, do we understand more. This is well done and the film, decently directed by Tate Taylor, knows how to use mystery well.

There are, however, some problems that prevent the film from being really good: despite the mysteries and twists, it feels like it is a tepid film, without the dramatic tension that is needed and which would be a very pleasant bonus. I also found the film slow, although that seems like a minor problem to me. It wastes time in some scenes, yes, but I handled the subject well. A friend of mine also said that the film's story resembled a Brazilian soap opera script. I'm not going to argue that, I partly agree with the way she saw things, but it didn't seem so melodramatic to me that it merited comparison. In fact, if there is one thing that seems absent from this film, it is love or, at least, the sweet romantic notion that we have of it.

Being such a feminine film and aimed at female audiences (at least, I had that feeling), it is quite natural that the male actors do not stand out, but what happens here is more radical: the male characters are quite sketchy and even ignored. , and I felt that they only appeared when they really had to. It's a shame, because the film has a good performance by Justin Theroux, who even seems to want to give us more and do better, even without the material for it. Edgar Ramírez does a decent job, but Luke Evans doesn't make much of an effort. The spotlight goes to Emily Blunt, who gives us one of the most interesting works of her career (up to that point) and deserves our attention whenever she appears on the scene. It's a shame that Rebecca Ferguson and Haley Bennett can't keep up with her and are always in her shadow.