In 1940s New York, down-on-his-luck Stanton Carlisle endears himself to a clairvoyant and her mentalist husband at a travelling carnival. Using newly acquired knowledge, Carlisle crafts a golden ticket to success by swindling the elite and wealthy. Hoping for a big score, he soon hatches a scheme to con a dangerous tycoon with help from a mysterious psychiatrist who might be his most formidable opponent yet.
At first glance, ‘Nightmare Alley’ gives off a lot of weird vibes and themes - from the initial trailers of the film that I caught, I was immediately interested (I’ll admit partly due to my nostalgia ridden mind before seeing Spider-Man No Way Home and seeing that Willem Dafoe stars here) due to the vastly different nature of the films storyline, characters and themes to what I have seen recently. As I just mentioned though, the varying list of interesting cast members was also really exciting to me before seeing this movie - from Bradley Cooper to Toni Collette to even Ron Periman, this varying list of actors intrigued me, and helped to add to the mysterious nature of the film prior to me even walking through the cinema doors! Onto what I thought of the film though, is this film more of a nightmare than it is a dream, here are my thoughts.
As mentioned previously, one of the biggest aspects that caught my attention was the varied and exciting cast list - the character roster was one of the high points and best parts of the film. During the initial stages of the film we are introduced to Stan, as he proceeds to burn his house down, it is a great introductory sequence for arguably the main character of the film, the film has a predominant theme of mystery and thrill, and Stan is at the heart of this. The mysterious nature of the film is established well and is maintained really well throughout due to the high intensity of the characters of the film, throughout the film we are introduced to a wide variety of characters, including circus performers, doctors and gangsters, and whilst this variety may seem excessive and overly ambitious, the film does a fantastic job of clearly establishing the relationships and bonds between these characters whilst delving into the personalities and emotions really well.
this effective communication that the film provides to us regarding who the characters are is really important because it helps to give them a genuine feeling to them that results in them being genuinely interesting. For example, despite the circus scenes taking up a good half of the film, acts and performances seemed genuinely interesting and exciting because of the effective ecosystem of characters that the film relays to us. Additionally, the film does a great job of keeping the characters interesting and engaging over a long period because of how characters develop and change, for example seeing Stan start out as a popular figure in the circus, we can actively watch his popularity and personalities change throughout the film, resulting in him ultimately becoming a hustler that returns to where he began, but even lower.
Now when I say that I was impressed with the performances in this film I really mean it, no character felt boring or out of place, and surprisingly despite there being a wide variety of character types, they seemed to fit together nicely like patchwork! However, there were a few standout performances for me, Bradley Cooper is arguably at his most comfortable here and shines as a mysterious yet menacing hustler, Willem Dafoe doesn’t appear as much as I would have maybe liked to but his eerie side that we saw in SpiderMan is prominent here and gives an effective insight into a troubled yet respected circus man. It’s little things like seeing him marvel at his disfigured collection of animals and babies that would seem extremely out of place anywhere, but Willem does a great job at playing the character to make this a part of who he is. Surprisingly, one of my favourite performances was from David Strathairn as Krumbein. He does a fantastic job at combining an interesting and insightful character that seems normal with a strange and surprising past of swindling, magic and trickery - all culminating to make him a great character, albeit a short time on the screen.
The film's storyline is equally as exciting and interesting, and engulfs us in the events of the film, I would argue that the best and worst part about the film is its nature to have two separate parts, with the latter being Stan and Molly venturing into city life. In some aspects, this has a really positive impact on the film because it helps to keep the film's storyline feeling fresh, whilst providing new insight into the characters and their actions. As I previously mentioned, the circus scenes are fantastic and add a lot to the film, primarily through getting us interested and invested in the characters, but the inclusion of a 'part two' that transports the characters gave them a new and fresh feeling.
In general, I was surprised as to how interesting and enjoyable the film's plot was, I was initially expecting more of a mystery film from the advertisements, however, I was pleasantly surprised by the amount of excitement and enjoyment that the film provided, sure it did have a good element of mystery to it, but I was more impressed by how easy the storyline was to follow, despite the large number of new characters and experiences that we see. This then resulted in the film feeling much more enjoyable, as we were able to immerse ourselves in Stan as a character, and see how he developed as a character depending on scenarios and events surrounding him, ultimately resulting in the story being thrilling, yet heartbreaking. The film is also able to combine the storyline with the sceneries and locations of the time really well too, it really immerses us within 1940s New York fantastically, through subtle references including 'Charlie Chaplin's beard is invading Poland', the film also has more obvious inclusions such as periodic cars and mannerisms, but the combination of these works really well here and gives a genuinely interesting scenery.
The film is certainly not perfect though, and has quite a few issues that I'd like to raise. One of the primary issues the film has relates to its 'Part 1 and Part 2' organisation, as I mentioned this is arguably the best and worst part of the film because of how the film manages this split. I not only found the first half to be more exciting, but also easier to follow, the transition of time between the two parts was really confusing for me, because we see a large number of changes and differences that the characters have overcome since the first part, and these changes impact their actions and behaviours in the second part, resulting in the reasoning behind these being extremely confusing and difficult to grasp. I also found that the second half of the film was just a lot slower in pace and even dragged on a little in some areas. The first half, set at the circus, seems leisurely enough, until everything reappears at the end, showing it was all foreshadowing. The Buffalo sequence is edited so tightly that you can't figure out Miss Blanchett's motives, and the ending feels rushed.
It is worth noting that the filming of the movie was suspended midway through for a good 6 months resulting from the coronavirus outbreak in March 2020. I wonder if that ended up "ruining" the film's atmosphere, thus resulting in a confusing split in the storyline. I can't say that I was disappointed though whilst walking out of the cinema because the mysterious nature of the film presented in adverts didn't give away a massive amount of its potential qualities.
Overall, I would give this film a 7. It was decent, and certainly the first half of the film was fun, engaging, exciting and genuinely enjoyable, but this film has a classic issue that can bring down even the best of films - poor pacing management. As mentioned, the film was split into two parts, these were not transitioned effectively to help maintain our understanding of the story and characters, sure it was an easy way of transporting us to the characters after 2 years, but the pacing and poor transitioning just left the second half feeling somewhat confusing and even dull at times. I would recommend watching this film, because it definitely has a lot to offer and for some, maybe an exciting and easy to follow the plot from start to finish, but for me once part 2 started, this began the downfall of the movie.
Thank you for reading my review, I hope you enjoyed reading it as much as I did watching the film and writing this review, I hope you have a lovely day! If you would like to check out my Official Facebook page where you can see sneak previous and more film insights then please consider checking out the link below!
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