MovieChat Forums > Strange Darling (2024) Discussion > A punch to the gut thriller.

A punch to the gut thriller.

posted 6 months ago by letess (1810)
10 replies | jump to latest

“Did summer save its thrillingest thriller for last?”

Sooooo much better than Longlegs. Lead female is so much better and so is the demon. Walk in and see it cold. Let it hit you head on.

[–] SickSpazmoid (876) 5 months ago

It is a pretty good little thriller (no horror at all, as IMDb is suggesting). Feels like a movie made 20 years ago, when movies were really good. At places they went a bit too far and there are some stupid things, but the two leads are great, especially the woman. I never heard of her before, but she was having a day here.

Definitely better than Longlegs. Longlegs has amazing visual style, but no story. Strange Darling is balancing well between the two without excelling in either.

7/10

[–] letess (1810) 5 months ago

Yeah, a little bit 90s.
I saw it without knowing anything about it. I think you shouldn’t know anything about this movie. I walked in off the street one afternoon. It had suspense (not as much as No Country for Old Men - but still kind of like that) and it could be a kind of a giallo. The lead female was fantastic. Loved the old hippies.

The “style” of LL could have been more evident if the story was more potent. Everything was too inert and in slo mo for me. These 2 movies probably shouldn’t be compared. But I liked Strange Darling.

[–] RoloTony (1338) 5 months ago

No Country is a good comparison in tone. I thought it was really good.

[–] alex321 (75) a month ago

[deleted]

[–] MinaVladimir (4086) 2 months ago

This movie is exactly why I prefer going in with as little to no knowledge of the plot as possible.

I hated it for the first 10 minutes. Why are you telling me this is shot on 35mm? What’s with the out of order narrative? Are we doing a Tarantino thing, what’s the deal?

I stuck with it though, and it won me over. Pretty clever, the out of order narrative made sense, great performances.

After watching the whole thing, I have no complains. Except for the 35mm notice, this is not needed information lol.

[–] letess (1810) 2 months ago

Did you see it in a theater? When? It was out for a short while months ago and I don’t think many saw it.

At first I thought how many times do we have to see a woman walk down a dark street late at night or heaven forbid get into a car. For this reason, I was thinking the two in the car was predictable. The long conversation in the car between the two was very Tarantino. A beautiful setup. And the whole thing spun around.

30mm?

[–] Seperatrix (1349) 2 months ago

I did enjoy this one much more than Longlegs (a film with potential), but we appear to be in the minority.

[–] letess (1810) 2 months ago

I don’t think anybody saw Strange Darling. LL had a lot of press and good reviews. As a viewer, you struggled - is the lead meant to be mentally impaired or is the actress. Nothing was scary.

I thought Strange Darling was totally out of the comfort zone. One reviewer “A Masterclass in Nonlinear Storytelling and Psychological Horror.” Actress excelled. There was an actual coherent script. A dark horse winner on best films of 2024.

[–] Seperatrix (1349) 2 months ago

I also think LL had more financial push from the studio due to the fact that it had a name -- Nicholas Cage -- to promote.

Even if Cage isn't exactly an A-list celebrity at this point, the name attached to a project certainly has more clout than a project with unknowns.

[–] letess (1810) 2 months ago

That’s for sure. And he was one of the worst serial killers I have ever seen. Cage is just one of those actors that if he’s in a film, they say it’s genius. I don’t even think he liked himself in this. Anyway, there won’t be a sequel. He was last great in Pig, and ironically this one I am not sure everyone saw.