With BLINK TWICE we traverse the sticky territories of toxic masculinity, cultural power structures, and the apology industry that has grown out those first two phenomena. While it’s script by E.T. Feigenbaum and director Zoë Kravitz sometimes hangs together with spit and baling wire, there is no denying the gut punch it delivers with suspense and black humor as it boldly extrapolates a perfectly reasonable scenario about what happens when unlimited wealth meets victim willing to suspend sound judgement in the face of a dream vacation on a private island.
Said island is owned by Slater King (Channing Tatum), a tech billionaire finishing his apology tour for an unnamed, but obviously heinous, offense against decency. That offence has done nothing to quell the fascination for him felt by Frida (Naomi Ackie), a food server struggling to make the rent with roommate Jess (Alia Shawkat) while waiting for her nail-embellishment business to take off. When fate throws her in Slater’s path at the annual King Gala, she ignores her employer’s warning to be less chatty than last year. Instead of the required smiling and being invisible, she unpacks two identical gala-worthy gowns (significantly one red and one blue) and crashes the party with Jess. Things don’t go smoothly, but an awkward Cinderella-type moment leads to that invitation to the private island where Slater gently courts Frida, and the intentional psychedelics provide bliss that involves amnesia about what happens in the dead of night.
We are, like Frida, seduced by Slater, played with disarmingly boyish charm by Tatum, as we are by the infantilization of life on the island. All needs are met, from the matching white resort wear, to the gourmet dinners, to the, ahem, intoxicating signature scent of the island left in each female visitor’s guest room. Who these women are and how they came to the island, ditzy Heather (Trew Mullen), survival reality show winner Sarah (Adria Arjona), who is also vying for Slater’s attention, and effete Camilla (Liz Caribel) are left mostly a mystery to be discovered, while the men, King, his coding boy wonder Lucas (Levon Hawke), best friend Vic (Christian Slater), chef Cody (Simon Rex), who is just a little too needy when it comes to Sarah, and spurned sad-sack Tom (Haley Joel Osment) who thinks a diet of hard-boiled eggs will make a woman fall in love with him, are set forth in detail. That, like so much in this intelligent film is deliberate in pursuit of its dialectic. As is King’s forever flustered assistant, Stacy (Geena Davis) and the infestation of pale poisonous vipers that infest the island. Not to mention the grim, non-English speaking natives who hunt them down with extreme prejudice.
The reveal is horrific, with imagery that a disclaimer at the start of the film might actually trigger some viewers. It is also necessary for the film to make its points, One would be committing all manner of sins in revealing any of it but suffice to say that the slow reveal as clues pile up is as disorienting as it is disconcerting. Kravitz may be working with broad themes here, but she keeps the action almost painfully personal, with tight close-ups that allow us to experience the growing suspicions of Slater and what happened to one of the group that mysteriously disappears. These are sharp, layered performances that make the denouement an overpowering experience over and above the violence it precipitates. All the clues are there from the beginning, with subtle power moves that are followed to their logical conclusion. From Slater badgering Stacy to find a place for a red chair that isn’t “weird”, to Cody’s continual pitching of unwelcome woo at Saray, to Tom and his strangled cry of the incel Also excellent is the art direction, that leans heavily on reds and whites, adding an element of graphic intensity to the graphic violence even before it begins, and a subtle air of unreality.
At one point a character repeats the phrase “I’m sorry” over and over again going from mocking to desperate to hysterical to sincere to psychotic. As a thespian exercise, it is stunning, as a commentary on the apology industry, and the capacity for individuals or society to give and accept an apology, it stuns with its ragged emotions and its desolation. BLINK TWICE has its imperfections. There is an ending vignette that is satisfying but abrupt in how we got there, but the strengths far outweigh weaknesses in a film that is merciless and breathtaking.
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