Greta is directed by Neil Jordan and co-written by him and Ray Wright, and is produced by Sidney Kimmel and Lawrence Bender. The movie tells of a young waitress, Frances (Chloe Grace Moretz), who after befriending a lonely French piano teacher, Greta (Isabelle Huppert), realizes that she’s a little more obsessive than she led on.
This plot isn’t hard to predict where it’s going, but what does interest me in how it’s executed. Neil Jordan’s a fine director and has made some thrilling works in the past (Interview with a Vampire, The Crying Game), so doing a stalker thriller seemed like a cakewalk for him to do...and this film definitely feels like he had that attitude. If you go into this with the mindset that this is a B grade thriller, you get a proper sense of enjoyment with this movie. The plot is pretty bare bones when it comes to twists, and that twisted mentality of Greta comparing herself to Frances’s mom is unsettling, but there isn’t much else that surprising that the script brings out. You know exactly the kinds of beats these types of films have, directed in a decent enough manner, but Jordan doesn’t really add a certain flare or style to make it seem unique. They even padd out the film with a fake-out dream sequence, that easily could have been cut from the movie entirely.
Chloe Grace Moretz and Isabelle Huppert are both great, and to me are the reason this film is watchable. Ever since she was nominated for Elle, I’ve been looking back at some of Huppert’s previous performances, including in Amour; as well as studying more of French cinema all together; the way her character is written and portrayed definitely has that essence leaning towards that more, which makes sense given that Jordan himself, while Irish, is also European. The moment she enters into the picture is when the movie truly begins. As you begin to see clues of her behavior that later come into play further on, you also see Frances start to pick up on those and put the pieces together on how crazy Greta is. It feels as though Huppert took this role as an exercise to possibly showcase her talents as a horror villain for any other big company; maybe someone like Jordan Peele or John Krasinski, maybe?
The downside of that is it barely leaves any room for the supporting cast to stand out, even for the friend, played by Maika Monroe, who ends up saving the day (not spoiling how), but I forgot she was in this after being absent for a while. The boss, the dad, the distant daughter of Greta, the PI played by Stephen Rea; all of them do fine, but the script doesn’t give them any chance to stand out.
It’s a shame, because I feel like this film could have been something, had there been a little more effort behind it. That’s the worst thing about a movie, when your audience for a movie is constantly thinking of things that could have made this work or stand out better. It’s a bare bones script with some top-notch acting from the leads; no special cinematography, no flashy edits, no disturbing twist like she eats children or something like that, just the basics. The only reason I would say to watch it is for Isabelle Huppert, but by the time she does get a horror villain role to play more to her talents, no one’s going to care about Greta.
Rating: C-
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