Alice, Darling

Directed by Mary Nighy, Alice, Darling follows Anna Kendrick’s Alice as she travels to a remote cabin with her friends and is eventually forced to reflect on her relationship with the emotionally-abusive Simon (Charlie Carrick). It’s relatively promising subject matter that is, for the most part, employed to hopelessly underwhelming (and frequently tedious) effect by Nighy, as the filmmaker, armed with Alanna Francis’ screenplay, delivers a pervasively low-rent endeavor that strikes all the wrong notes right from the get-go – with the arms-length atmosphere compounded by Mike McLaughlin’s styleless visuals and a series of generic, grating periphery characters. (Kendrick’s strong turn is, it goes without saying, completely squandered.) The aggressively overwrought vibe paves the way for a sluggish midsection devoid of authenticity or relatable elements, and although the movie improves slightly in its second half, particularly as Alice begins actually confronting her issues, Alice, Darling builds towards an eye-rollingly neat and tidy conclusion that’s ultimately indicative of the picture’s far-from-subtle sensibilities.

** out of ****