 REVIEW: Kidman Grits Her Teeth and We Grip Our Armrests in "Destroyer" |
It's no secret that Nicole Kidman is a force to be reckoned with. She's a four-time Oscar nominee and winner (and a whopping thirteen-time Golden Globe nominee) and easily one of our greatest and most recognizable movie actresses. We shouldn't be surprised to see her take a role like this and knock it out of the park. In fact, we should be numb to her talents by now. And yet, within the first few minutes of Karyn Kusama's Destroyer, we are back to being transfixed by Kidman's raw talent. I could write a novel about how good Kidman is in this film and how much weight is granted to this story by her presence, but I have to keep this review a decent length, so allow me to dedicate the next paragraph to Nicole Kidman.
Kidman plays the role of a hard-boiled detective on the hunt for a gang leader Silas (Toby Kebbell) she knew in her past that has reemerged and she decides to take matters into her own hands. It's a very simple premise that we've seen before, but there's a genuine magic electricity that sparks between the collaboration of Kidman and Kusama that elevates this into near-great territory. It can be distracting at first to see Kidman looking as rough as she does as the character of detective Erin Bell. The makeup in general is so good, you might find yourself so absorbed into the image of Kidman's chiseled jaw and sunken eyes, you have to remind yourself to pay attention to the story. For as thin and aged as Kidman's character looks, when she gets physical, loading bullets into her guns and throwing hard-blow fists at Silas' accomplices, you believe it. Yet, beyond her physicality, Kidman finds the soul and fragility of her character, which creeps out the more her past begins to haunt her.
Kusama is the other magic ingredient to this production. Minus a very clever end surprise and a nice parallel past and present back-and-forth structure, the script follows along the usual conventions of the standard LA cop thriller. It's essentially, Bell hunting down people tied to Silas' gang and getting a step further with each encounter. The tension, though, is expertly shot and crafted by Kusama, who uses longer takes of Kidman running towards a dangerous situation and gliding the camera along her physical confrontations as though our visual perspective is taking part in the action. Kusama knows this is a grimy, gritty story and never holds back in forcing us to go along throughout this the length of this dark story. There's a moment where Kidman even has to... "pleasure" a former member of Silas' gang for answers and we watch Kidman brilliantly commit to this scene while our eyes commit to the screen, even when we want to look away.
Kusama has even assembled a wide-range cast of great character actors to assist Kidman so that it's not entirely a one-woman show. Sebastian Stan continues his impressive resume of giving undervalued performances in awards-caliber films (following his terrific role in last year's I, Tonya). Stan plays Chris, a former partner of Kidman's, who in her past helped her infiltrate Silas' gang to take them down from the inside. Tatiana Maslaney is appropriately grungy and abrasive as a member of Silas' gang as well as his part-time lover. Kidman and Maslaney have a bare-knuckle brawl that (with the combination of their performances, camerawork, and swift sound design) is so brutal, you can feel every punch just sitting in your seat. Bradley Whitford (the decade's new go-to character actor it seems) makes douchebaggery look easy in his small, but memorable role as an associate of Silas.
My only flaw in the cast is Silas himself, Toby Kebbell. Kebbell is an excellent actor, and his performance here is strong, but he just never feels cast well. His presence and his look all feel the opposite of how his character is described in the film. It's hard enough to believe he and Kidman are supposed to be in the same age range (even with the excellent makeup). It doesn't help that he's wearing a wildly voluptuous black wig for most of his screentime. It's more of a nitpick casting choice than a real problem, but otherwise, the cast are all doing terrific work.
It's a shame that the film's last ten minutes wobble the film slightly when approaching the finish line. Beyond a solid twist, the anticlimactic finale just doesn't deliver in comparison to what came before and Kusama uses these last moments to inject a last minute dose of self-indulgent importance which feels unnecessary after such a clean-cut, lean-mean plot structure that brilliantly used its increasingly-heightened tension to showcase its moments of raw emotion. The film's last few moments just feel like the audience is being spoon-fed an emotionally-impactful ending when those of us that were locked in and engaged in the story already felt the impact and the closing moments just feel tacked on and drug out. But that's a flawed ten minutes in a brilliant two hour runtime. Destroyer may end up being one of the most overlooked and underseen great films from last year, and regardless on if the story doesn't quite resonate for some, Kidman is the reason to purchase a ticket. She uses the opportunity to get down and dirty to deliver one of the best performances in her amazing career and it needs to be seen to be believed.
“Destroyer,” an Annapurna Pictures release, is rated R for for language throughout, violence, some sexual content and brief drug use. Running time: 123 minutes. Three and a half stars out of four.
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