MOVIE REVIEW: "Destroyer" (2018)

Synopsis: Erin Bell is an American police detective who agrees to take part in a risky plan, infiltrating bandits for information. The strategy goes wrong, generating a tragedy that marks your life forever. Years later, she finds clues from the gang of yore, and goes back to chase after those responsible for her personal drama.

Recognizing an obstacle and trying to get as close to it is one of the most effective ways to try to solve it, because once you know your enemy, you are more likely to defeat him. Sometimes it is necessary to dive deep into this search for the solution and to be able to fight with property, having - among many other aspects - the knowledge of the cause is often essential... But, what would be the limit not to be crossed in the middle of this complex journey?

Move on and try to redo life by ignoring the past or revisit it and try to "rewrite" the facts? This is the main and the most strongest dilemma that drives the whole movie and the heavy drama experienced by the protagonist, which amid her painful memories of a complicated past, proves to be devastating when she has to learn to deal with her inner monsters in order to use them. in her favor in the search for the longed for justice and the feeling of well being with herself.

Destroyed by time, by lack of perspective when looking into her limited horizon, b a dominant anguish, and fueling a growing thirst for vengeance (a poison self-administered without any mercy), Erin finds what she has been looking for when she has the opportunity. revisit your past and do it justice with your own hands. However, she did not know that she would have to pay so dearly to achieve this and would put much more at stake than she could imagine.

This scenario is very conducive - and assertive - for the story to present itself as something important and deserves instant attention from the viewer. Being aware of the power that lies in its essence, the script manages to take root in several aspects and continues to broaden its impact domain when its developing bets on increasingly challenging and reflective dramatic aspects. What would continue to be as a police drama coupled with explosive action scenes is then replaced by a psychological drama of immeasurable (but no less explosive) proportions.

Nicole Kidman does a magnificent job - in the midst of a moderately talented cast, but still all them are performing well - in playing one of the toughest and best-built characters of her career with extreme quality (the intensity dominates most of her scenes). Physically and psychologically shaken by the course of her life (here it is worth mentioning that the efficient makeup work that helped make everything more visible), detective Erin is a sad and visceral portrait of a human being who had to arrive. at rock bottom and be nourished with a lot of courage to get out of it.

Director Karyn Kusama's work is remarkable - even though she has some very punctual errors - and yet she has very crude and very rough driving (a combination not very attractive to the general public), she proves to be cautious in recognizing the boundaries that must be respected not to make the experience of watching this movie very appealing. In contrast, Kusama exaggerates a bit by prolonging the script without a clear need for it... If the movie were shorter, it would flow better, be more agile and would not suffer from the setback of sometimes boring.

Elements such as dense photography (marked by very characteristic visual elements that offer other perspectives to better understand the story, which by the way... has no obvious conclusion) and a thrilling soundtrack (whenever the chords are present... they all praise the scenes in an ascending way) are fundamental tools for raising the qualit level of the movie and for the necessary support that underpins the narrative structure to gain the ideal weight to become solid (albeit slow in its construction) to the point of arouse public empathy.

Detroyer is a very well-intentioned movie that is packed with great moments (some of them are not so easy for most conservative viewers to digest because they have moments of explicit violence), but unfortunately... It ends up sinning for his vulnerability (and at times even for some predictability) amidst a rather tiring dramatic approach that extends beyond count throughout its projection.