Film Review: The Pale Blue Eye is a satisfying murder-mystery with a loaded cast
Toby Jones and Gillian Anderson in The Pale Blue Eye.
- The Pale Blue Eye
- ★★★★☆
Edgar Allan Poe might have invented the detective story with his 1841 story The Murders in the Rue Morgue, but he’s a supporting character in (15A), a murder-mystery that opens in upstate New York in 1830 with the discovery of a West Point cadet who was hanged and afterwards mutilated, his heart cut from his body.
When Augustus Landor (Christian Bale), a law enforcement veteran, is commissioned by Superintendent Thayer (Timothy Spall) to investigate the grisly crime, his attention is first drawn to the rather strange young cadet, Edgar Poe (Harry Melling), who seems obsessed by the macabre aspects of the case … Adapted from Louis Bayard’s novel by writer-director Scott Cooper, who previously directed Bale in the neo-Western Hostiles (2017), The Pale Blue Eye is an ambitious, slow-burning thriller that delivers a complex story, one that alludes to possible inspirations for Edgar Allan Poe’s future literary career.
Set during an iron-hard winter – the bleak, snowy wastes of rural New York are beautifully shot by cinematographer Masanobu Takayanagi – the story evolves from a conventional whodunit into an exploration of humanity’s deepest and darkest desires as it gleefully tosses supernatural elements into an otherwise grimly realistic tale. Christian Bale cuts a sombre figure as the reluctant detective who is deeply mourning his own loss, but even his brooding presence is overshadowed by Harry Melling, who might have been born to play Edgar Allan Poe, his cadaverous appearance a sharp contrast to his impeccable manners and mellifluous Southern charm.
It’s a good cast that can afford to throw away Timothy Spall on a relatively minor role, although here he’s in good company: Toby Jones, Charlotte Gainsbourg, Lea Boynton, Gillian Anderson and Robert Duvall are the stand-outs in a superb supporting cast. Complex, dark and twisting, The Pale Blue Eye is a wholly satisfying murder-mystery. (cinema release)
