The attraction turns out to be problematic if not deadly in “pretty thing”. Those who have missed the steam of the point of the era “erotic thriller” as defined by “9 1/2 weeks”, “basic instinct” and so on can find nostalgic pleasure in this smooth enterprise so more modest, with Alicia Silverstone as a middle -aged business woman who collects the sexy stalker.
Director Justin Kelly (“I am Michael”, “JT Leroy”) and the actor who has become a Donelly writer do a decent job to install things, narrative shots with sweet pedance and offer a medium quality sexes, relatively little noyal in a good production of good screens. But the suspense mechanisms never develop much momentum and despite solid performance, the script lacks sufficient depth to function as a serious character drama. So this “thing” ends up being forgettable, this spell sealed by a weak melted. Nevertheless, it is a way to entertain a way to spend 90 minutes.
To a kind of reception in a high -end hotel in Manhattan, the Sophie (Silverstone) clientele applauds their eyes to the server of the Elliot (Glusman) restaurants, creating an immediate mutual thrill. Soon, many other parts of the body are also in communication. Although the server with wide-eyed eyes admits “I cannot say that I did something like this before” presents it as a stand-in of Mamoire Benjamin Braddock from his assertive Mme Robinson, he is apparently quite natural. So that it invites him impulsively to come during a work trip to Paris, where he can see the views when she is occupied at meetings. The rest of the time, Natch, they are … Uh, busy with each other. It is an exhilarating experience for Elliot, whose life at this point has not been far away beyond the small low-level jobs and the needs of her mother of support but sticky invalid (Catherine Curtin), with whom he still lives.
When he later insisted to release Sophie as a thank you, he is written everywhere on her bored face that her choice of entertainment, watering holes and friends is strictly amateur compared to his executive class standards. As dynamic as their sexual chemistry is, they otherwise have nothing in common. In any case, she does not seek a relationship – she is fortunately “married” to her career, designing marketing campaigns for multinational pharmaceutical companies. Once it becomes clear that Elliot Smitten cannot accept that their own is just a busy adventure, it sends it a polisher -appeal text although you
He doesn’t take it well. At this median point, you could expect the “pretty thing” to take familiar paths of the revenge of lovers of psychotic jilation. But no rabbit is boiled here, and Donelly seems reluctant to embrace the melodrama at the same time as he does not manage to provide the psychological details necessary to raise this story above expectations of the gender.
We can understand Sophie quite well in the expert performance of Silverstone: she is a woman with a healthy sexual appetite whose other needs are satisfied with the professional plane, where she is motivated and authoritative. While Elliot remains something with a figure, a manchild whose amply displayed abs have more definition than his character. Glusman is perfectly good, but the writing leaves this figure too much of a naive to seem threatening or being credible when Elliot in a way bypass Sophie’s protective barriers. (He never explained how he ends up sneaking in his high security apartment.) Rarely, the dialogue does a lot to deepen our understanding of dramatic personalities, especially in heroin interactions with other women: notably Tammy Blanchard in a scene she consults for advice.
The challenges increase, while reprisals between the two sexual friends have become increasingly antagonistic fighters. However, the film does not strengthen much tension, its rhythm remaining quietly throughout. There is a core of an idea of earthing here, that Sophie (which does a boxing training in a gymnasium) becomes more physically violent in his rejection of an undesirable pretender, Elliot realizes that he is an emerging masochist captivated by such a punitive treatment. But it’s too badly developed to have a lot of weight – not to mention the hanging. Indeed, the closing note here seems so wrong, it reduces the whole at the level of a too wide anecdote, providing something more in the league of a punchline than any real resolution.
Until this disappointment, however, the “pretty thing” is reasonably pleasant and elegant in probable means. The cinematography of Matthew Klammer and the selected locations transmit the kind of elegance that an average Joe like Elliot could be seduced, especially in the primary Parisian section. The original partition of Tim Kvasnosky offers a vocal element without a word that has an echo of European chic European soundtracks from the 1960s. Sex scenes also display a mixture of passion and restraint (there is practically no nudity) which is more good taste than Luridly Hubba-Hubba.
Shout! Studios publishes “Pretty Thing” to limit American theaters and on demand platforms on July 4.
