Everyone needs a friend. At least that is usually the case, but when you give a random stranger her handbag back, do not make friends with her — “Greta” only proves this.
The film is an exceptional thriller that kept me on the edge of my seat, waiting for the next scene to occur.
After watching the short, yet eventful trailer, to this film I knew I needed to see it. I considered this a horror film, but when I watched it I realized it was a thriller. I tend to not watch these too often. However, I am much more of a fan after watching this film.
Lindsay Trombly | Argonaut
The trailer set an expectation in my mind, which ended up pretty high for the film. It seems like the clip gives all information away, except it doesn’t. This is a great trait, and frankly, is hard to find in films anymore. That’s what made the film so great.
“Greta” focuses on Frances, who is struggling with her relationship with her father since her mother died. She lives with her best friend Erica in an apartment, while waitressing at a fancy restaurant. Yet, when she finds a black handbag on the subway her whole life changes forever.
She picks up this handbag and returns it to Greta, the owner, and they kindle a mother-daughter relationship that Frances has missed with her own mother. Yet one evening, she finds a collection of the exact same handbag in Greta’s home. There are dozens of them with the same contents in each bag. Francis panics unsure about what to do and goes home.
She realizes that Greta plants these bags purposely on the subway. She decides to stop spending time with this woman, who she hardly knows, and answering Greta’s phone calls — only they keep coming. Greta also shows up around every corner, standing outside of Frances’s work, outside her apartment and even stalks her roommate.
The police don’t help Frances in this situation and she is on her own. Only Greta takes it up a notch and abducts her. Frances is trapped in Greta’s home for weeks — possibly even months.
Maybe it was the fact that only four people were sitting in the theater at the time and it was dead silent, or the film was just that compelling, but it was spectacular. The character development with Greta, as well as Frances, gives the audience a sense of story — not just a plot formed because a murderer is on the loose.
The acting is also a spectacular element to this film. Isabelle Huppert who plays Greta in the film absolutely nailed her role in the story. There was not one minute in the film where I questioned her craziness. She kept that to the very end.
When Greta gets what she finally deserves in the end, the loud music and use of zoom from the camera lead me to believe that this might possibly turn into a franchise, or at the very least, a second film. I am hopeful this will happen in the future.
Remember, if you find a handbag on the subway, bring it to the lost and found. Do not go and give it to the owner — you have no idea who they are. Let alone if they will end up stalking you in order to kill you.
Lindsay Trombly can be reached at [email protected] or on Twitter @ lindsay_trombly