Actress Zoe Kravitz makes her directorial debut with a new thriller in theaters. Blink Twice introduces us to cocktail waitress Frida (Naomi Ackie) who has a massive crush on tech billionaire Slater King (Channing Tatum). King holds a fundraising gala at Frida’s job where they two have a chance encounter and instantly hit it off. King invites her and her roommate Jess (Alia Shawkat) to join him and his friends for a dream vacation on his private island. After a few days at King’s compound strange things start to happen. Frida soon teams up with another guest Sarah (Adria Arjona) to uncover the truth of what King and his friends are really up to.
For a director making their feature film debut, what immediately stands out about Kravitz’s style is the visual flair she imbues the film with. Blink Twice is chock full of visual storytelling, showing but not telling the audience various tidbits and clues about the mystery at the center of the plot, and an intimate style of shooting and framing the characters. Kravitz utilizes pull back shots numerous times throughout the film, allowing the camera to first focus on the intimate closeups of the characters she also frequently features before slowly revealing the rest of the shot. The film opens with such a shot focused on a lizard’s head before quickly transitioning to a shot of Frida looking through her fingernail art of lizard images. Kravitz continually focuses her camera on small details like this to slowly unveil the plot and move it forward in piecemeal fashion. The first time director also appears to be a fan of tracking shots which are also seen throughout the film with various framing, including wide shots that particularly focus on King’s island mansion. Her use of the camera attempts to pull the audience in alongside the characters in the first two acts creating an intimate visual style. It makes for a visually interesting film that’s intriguing to look at as the story itself unfolds.
As interesting as Blink Twice is to look at, the film itself starts off with promise, but ultimately regresses to the mean once it enters its second act. The film does a good job setting the stage for a mystery hiding under the thin veneer of a whirlwind romance between King and Frida, but the second act meanders a bit and takes a bit too long to get to the point about something being off at the other wise idyllic island getaway. The film’s ultimate themes settle on the danger that women feel from male predation and the need for them to band together to combat the threat from the opposite sex. It results in a message that feels rote and done to death offering nothing new to say. The cliched, derivative points and plot don’t hurt the film per se, but prevent it from being more than just a decent watch. Still, it’s a promising debut for a first time director in Kravitz with definite positives to build on.
Image: Amazon MGM Studios
