The Woman in the Window

Director: Joe Wright
Starring: Amy Adams, Gary Oldman, Anthony Mackie, Fred Hechinger, Wyatt Russell, Brian Tyree Henry, Julianne Moore, Jennifer Jason Leigh, Tracy Letts
Running Time: 100 min.
Rating: R 

★★ ½ (out of ★★★★)  

The most surprising aspect of Joe Wright's long gestating The Woman in the Window is how underwhelming the results are given the staggering amount of talent involved. Of course, this happens, as movies collecting dust in post-production are frequently dumped onto streaming services with little to no fanfare. But in this instance, Netflix actually went to some lengths to promote it, perhaps hoping the cast's pedigree would overcome its creative flaws, which keep piling up as its story becomes more involved and convoluted. It starts with rather transparent aspirations of honoring Hitchcock or De Palma before devolving into an inferior Scream sequel in its second half, complete with a clumsy reveal. And that's a shame since you can kind of see the skeletal framework of a film that may have really worked under different circumstances, as a few stronger performances seem in search of the better material these actors mistakenly thought they signed onto.

Based on a 2018 bestseller by A.J. Finn, that this script was adapted by Tony-winning playwright (and gifted character actor) Tracy Letts leads you to believe something got lost on its journey from his pen to the screen. That it was supposed to be released in late 2019 confirms as much, as viewers will be jumping through hoops to deal with some of the arbitrary contrivances before reaching an ending that lands with a thud. While there are laughs to be had, it mostly takes itself too seriously for that, especially when information comes to light that would have ended the film ten minutes after it started. Knowing this, it's unlikely many would have stuck around for the over-the-top third act that wraps up what's been a strange and wildly inconsistent mystery.

Depressed, agoraphobic child psychologist Anna Fox (Amy Adams) lives alone in her Manhattan brownstone apartment after separating from her husband Edward (Anthony Mackie), who currently has custody of their daughter, Olivia (Mariah Bozeman). Mixing drinks and medications on a daily basis, Anna's psychiatrist Dr. Landy (Letts) becomes concerned with her obsession of watching all the neighbors from a second floor window, while also acknowledging that interest could be a subtle sign of progress in her therapy. But when spouses Alistair (Gary Oldman) and Jane (Julianne Moore) Russell move in across the street with their teen son, Ethan (Fred Hechinger), Anna's takes her spying to another level.

After two separate encounters with a clearly dispondant Ethan and a flighty Jane, Anna begins suspecting the mother and son are trapped in an abusive household. When she believes she sees Jane get stabbed to death by husband Alistair through her zoom lens, his furious denials and attempts to discredit Anna to Detective Little (Brian Tyree Henry) begin. Anna's basement tenant, singer-songwriter David (Wyatt Russell), provides little help in corroborating her story while possibly hiding some secrets of his own. With her mental state deteriorating and everyone gaslighting her into doubting what she saw, Anna works overtime to put together clues that prove this horrific crime was really committed and not merely a construct of her fragile psyche.

While the film is all over the map in terms of plot, the amount of time it spent on the shelf probably helped it in some ways, at least as far as its themes of isolation seeming timelier than they otherwise would. And for about half the film, the script does seem very seriously interested in taking us into the fractured headspace of this woman who obviously experienced a severe trauma we only later discover the details of. 

Losing herself in classic movies and TV, Anna's exiled herself inside this apartment with her cat, and the remainder of her entertainment is provided by spying on this wealthy, dysfunctional family across the street. Other than  sporadic phone conversations with her estranged husband and the weekly psychiatric counseling, she's in her own world, reality hanging by a thread after an adjustment to her meds. 

Adams is really strong in these opening scenes and her interactions with Hechinger, as this desperately off, needy teen, are unnerving and affecting. But it's the entrance of an entertainingly loopy Julianne Moore as "Jane Russell" that sends everything into a tailspin, but not an altogether welcome one, through no fault of Moore's performance, which is probably better than the story deserves. 

After Anna witnesses Jane's murder the entire scenario goes down this rabbit hole where everyone starts questioning her sanity and the mystery unfolds as to whether everything's playing out in her head. The more information that's revealed the sillier it gets, more closely resembling one of those 90's direct-to-video thrillers than the Hitchcockian whodunnit it initially purported itself as being. 

Most of the film's charms are found in these supporting turns, with the possible exceptions of Gary Oldman's relegation to stock villainy and Jennifer Jason Leigh being given the least to do of anyone as the supposed "real" Jane Russell, an eleventh hour wrench thrown into the plot. While the characters are comparable to pieces on a game board, both Hechinger and Wyatt Russell make the most of what they're given, with the latter proving more than capable of handling darker material you'll wish was better after seeing his performance. And despite fairly limited screen time, Moore makes the biggest impact in her extended scenes opposite Adams, teasing the potential for a gripping mystery that just never quite gets off the ground.

This is one of those projects where the harder the script works, the returns only seem to keep diminishing. It's not a chore to sit through and Adams has a great grasp on her character, but whatever subtly the story had at its start literally goes, if you'll forgive the pun, out the window with a fascinating mess of a finale. Featuring a gotcha revelation that's partially confusing and not as surprising as you'd think, it really does channel one of those cheap slasher endings in all the wrong ways. 

Since Adams basically headlines every other film released these days, this feels like a bigger departure for Wright, who's a long way off from Atonement and Hanna, dipping his feet into the waters of a bargain basement thriller he tries his best to elevate. We'll never know the exact circumstances surrounding how The Woman in the Window turned out like it did, making it almost uncomfortable to assign blame. But even those able to have fun with this would have a tough time claiming it reaches its full potential, whatever that was intended to be.