JT Mollner’s serial-killer thriller is a wild ride you won’t see coming.
By James Verniere/Boston Movie News

From writer-director JT Mollner, whose only previous feature is the violent 2016 Western “Outlaws and Angels,” comes the very twisted and twisty “Strange Darling,” a future cult film that starts like a standard serial-killer crime drama and then turns the tables on us in ways I cannot reveal. I can say that the film boasts stellar work by its two leads: Tom Hardy look-alike Kyle Gallner (“Scream”) and Willa Fitzgerald (TV’s “Reacher” and “The Fall of the House of Usher”). Although she has been working steadily, the 33-year-old Yale Drama School graduate delivers a star-is-born-level performance as the film’s female lead. But how do I review a performance that is all spoilers?

“Strange Darling” bills itself as “A Thriller in Six Chapters.” What you don’t know (at first) is that those chapters are going to be shuffled like a deck of cards (we start with Chapter 3), and the results are going to be revelatory in ways that those overrated “Glass Onion” movies only pretend to be.

Willa Fitzgerald in a scene from the serial-killer thriller "Strange Darling."
Willa Fitzgerald in a scene from the serial-killer thriller “Strange Darling.”

A caption early in the film (narrated by Jason Patric) tells us that the Oregon-set story we are about to see is based on a true story of a “multi-state crime spree” from 2018 to 2020. I’m not sure I believe that (I Googled it). I guess I have to believe that the film was very well shot in 35mm by actor and (now) cinematographer Giovanni Ribisi because both those facts are in the credits.

A young woman (Fitzgerald), named the Lady in the credits, sits in a vehicle with a young man listed as the Demon (Gallner). They are both smokers. She is trying to decide if she is going to share a room at the Blue Angel Hotel and have sex with him. “Are you a serial killer?” she asks. Ha-ha. He loosens her up with a beer and whiskey. We hear a guitar and vocals, then the old standard “Love Hurts.” Is it a premonition? Not very surprisingly, we cut to the man strangling the off-camera woman. But then, it turns out that they are playing a sex game. Harder, she implores. Check twist number one.

It is a game of death, all right. Many innocent people rapidly suffer terrible fates in “Strange Darling.” The next thing we know, the man chases the woman in a big truck. She’s driving, for reasons that will not make sense until later, a 1978 Ford Pinto. He causes her to crash by firing a rifle bullet through her window. She runs into the Arcadian, fern-filled woods (the film was shot in Oregon). He pursues.

Grazed in the head, she seeks shelter in the comfortable, flower-filled country home of two “old hippies” (veterans Barbara Hershey and Ed Begley, Jr.). This is where the film goes all topsy-turvy, and you wonder if you’re watching a truly demented version of “Alice in Wonderland” with a more unhinged than usual Alice. When the old man starts frying up eggs in a stick of butter, you wonder who the real murderer is. At first, the old couple wonders if the young woman was chased in the woods by “Squatchi.” It turns out that they are “Doomsday-ers.” Well, Doomsday has come.

The plot will involve bear spray, a taser, several guns, including a Winchester-type rifle, a knife, and drugs. Several scenes feature handcuffs. The young woman mentions Gary Gilmore and the young man asks who that is. As the woman on the run, Fitzgerald, who resembles Julia Garner, is resourceful, relentless, and fearsome. She is like one of the Furies of Greek mythology, with a face smeared in vivid red blood. Fitzgerald turns Lady into someone we may have never seen before. We gaze upon both part and actor in awe and wonder. Writer-director Mollner just threw his hat into the ring. Will he be assimilated by the Borg, uh, I mean, Disney? Or will he break out? That’s the real next chapter.

‘Strange Darling’

Rating: R for strong/bloody violent content, sexual material, drug use, and language.

Cast: Willa Fitzgerald, Kyle Gallner, Barbara Hershey, Ed Begley Jr.

Director/Writer: JT Mollner

Running time: 96 minutes

Where to Watch: AMC Boston Common, AMC Causeway, Kendall Square Cinema, and other suburban theaters.

Grade: A-