Last Night in Soho
100 words or less: Holy crap this movie is great. From the Camera work and CGI, to the performances, all the way to the creepy atmosphere and the progressively shifting tone of the movie, I loved everything about this movie. The soundtrack is perfect, the twist at the end is beautifully executed and the story is creative and keeps you interested throughout. I am only slightly biased as I am a big fan of Thomasin McKenzie and Anya Taylor-Joy, but they are perfect in their roles and are phenomenal in this movie.
Full Review: I am in love with this movie. The plot intrigued me from the first time I saw the trailers, a girl who moves to London and starts to have dreams and visions of another girl from the 60’s who was murdered. Then there is the actors in the movie, Thomasin McKenzie, who I fell in love with in JoJo Rabbit, plays the main character Eloise and Anya Taylor-Joy, who I haven’t seen as much but is adored by many from her role in The Queen’s Gambit, plays Sandy, the girl from the 60’s from Eloise’s dreams. The Soundtrack is beautiful, comprising of songs from the 60’s that Eloise plays on her vinyl records and hears in her dreams (and can we talk about the slowed down version of Downtown that Anya Taylor-Joy recorded for the movie?) All of these things combine for a haunting movie that builds from a normal girl moves to the big city movie to a truly creepy, almost horror movie like tone that toes the line between horror and suspense amazingly.
The best part about this movie is the camera work and I am assuming the CGI but not 100% sure they didn’t just use clever tricks to achieve some of the shots. If you aren’t a fan of nerding out about how movies are filmed, skip this section because I am going to ramble on about it because holy crap there were some amazing shots. Most of these shots occur in the dream sequences where Eloise is following Sandy in the past. One shot in particular stuck with me, Sandy and Jack (the man Sandy meets and helps get her a gig at a club) are in a taxi talking. In the REFLECTION OF THE WINDOW, is Eloise watching this all happen. I have no clue how they achieved this but it was such a cool shot and they do this multiple times, usually using Mirrors, showing Sandy and Eloise experiencing the same things, or Eloise watching Sandy have a conversation. I just absolutely love when movies take creative ways to show people in scenes where they aren’t truly there and it just makes me giggle like a little kid when it is executed well.
I won’t spoil the twist in this movie but it is so well executed and if you truly pay attention to the movie there are a ton of hints towards the outcome but they are so subtle that unless you know what to look for you may still not see it coming, I was caught off guard for sure, but it was great and the final 15 minutes of the movie really kick the tension up a notch. We also get an interesting 2 minute stretch where the movie kind of goes full on horror which was a bit nerve-racking but it fit with what was occurring in the scene.
I highly recommend this movie to anyone who enjoys suspense movies and can handle two jump scares throughout a 2 hour movie, but really I just think this movie should be seen by everyone it is a fantastic movie and Edgar Wright really knocked this one out of the park.
10/10 Coke cans claimed by Elouise.
