The Girl on the Train - B+

​Quick Hit: It may be a by-the-books thriller for most of it, but Blunt turns in such a performance that you need to watch it.

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I went into this film not really knowing what to expect. It was based on a book, and it starred Emily Blunt. That was enough for me to go into it cautiously optimistic. It’s rare that I go into a movie without knowing everything about it, whether from having read the book it was based off of, or the comic, or an internet article, or just the God-forsaken trailers.

I went into this film not really knowing what to expect. It was  based  on  a  book,   and  it  starred 

Emily Blunt. That was enough for me to go into it cautiously optimistic. It’s rare that I go into a movie without knowing everything about it, whether from having read the book it was based off of, or the comic, or an internet article, or just the God-forsaken trailers.

Let’s say that I wasn’t disappointed, but I also wasn’t blown away.

The movie follows Rachel (Emily Blunt), a woman who is obviously very far gone. She’s an alcoholic, can barely stand or even speak, and consistently rides the train every day into the city, despite the fact that she’s been fired by her job. She lives with her friend (Donna from that 70s show), and consistently

calls her ex-husband. It’s a wonder that Rachel is a likeable character, or even watchable at all, a fact that is immediately attributable to Blunt’s power as an actress.

​The mystery comes when Rachel sees the perfect couple (that happened to live next door to where she lived with her husband, before he cheated on her with the woman who is now his wife and baby mama), and the woman is with a different man. This leads her to binge drink heavier than normal, leading to a black-out. When she awakes the next day, she’s covered in blood, and the perfect woman has gone missing.

Go hard Ms. Blunt. Go hard.

There’s a lot of intrigue in this movie as you try to piece together what is happening. It unfortunately gets revealed early to those that are paying attention to the clues, or just to the fact that there are very few people actually in the movie. However, it still brings up Gone Girl in a sense of suburbanized, behind-the-scenes murder story. There is so much that goes on behind the closed doors, you find yourself wondering about your own neighbors, and where the woods behind your house lead (if I had woods behind my house, that is).

Oh, and this guys in it, because apparently Hollywood loves him in the past few years.

One of the things that is immediately apparent is the dreary, color bleached setting that everything was filmed in. There are very few places in the film that have drastic color, one of which being the color ​jacket that Megan goes missing in. I think it would be fun to watch this movie again and see if some of the colors that do show have significance to the plot, possibly hinting at what happened to her. I will say this

though…the colors match with the film. There are some scenes that really hurt me as a parent. If you are one, I’d advise at least some caution before you pop it in. There is the matter of one character’s backstory, there is a scene where a child is taken while the mother sleeps, and there is another example of child death. The scene is played intensely, and you feel the mother’s pain as well.

Overall, I thought the film was pretty good. I’m going to give it a “B+”.

For more on this film, check out IMDB.