‘Reptile’ Review: A Benicio del Toro and Alicia Silverstone Reunion Can’t Save Convoluted Crime Drama | Toronto
On his way to another showing of a property he is trying to sell, Will Grady (Justin Timberlake) gets an alert on his phone from his girlfriend Summer (Matilda Lutz), that triggers him to go back to the place they are staying to see if she is okay. When he shows up at the house, the score by Yair Elazar Glotman and Arca starts to creep into the world of director Grant Singer’s Reptile, signaling that Summer has been murdered and that the chase is on to find her killer. In this new crime procedural, we slowly find out that the case itself isn’t really what the film will focus on, but instead the man behind the case, and the corruption of his moral code as a police officer and as a man.
When he gets the call to lead the investigation for Summer’s death, detective Tom Nichols (Acadmy Award winner Benicio del Toro), is out to dinner with all of his friends from the force, as their boss, Captain Robert Allen (Eric Bogosian), is taking them out for a nice meal to show his appreciation for all of their work. Multiple scenes throughout the film establish a compelling bond amongst Tom and his fellow officers, making them more like a family than coworkers. Tom is known to be the best in the department, even though he has a checkered past from his previous stints as a detective when his ex-partner was put up for corruption charges. When he refused to rat him out, he was forced to relocate to the quieter town of Scarborough, Maine, a location that seems plain on the surface and is far more sinister than we are first introduced to. While he is being given a chance to work as a detective in this town without the slack of his previous work hanging over him, it does help that his wife Judy (Alicia Silverstone) is related to Robert. In creating these tight bonds, Reptile effectively builds the cinematic world Tom lives in and how these relationships can help and ultimately destroy Tom’s faith in the system that allows him to be the thing he loves to be more than anything; a detective.
Working alongside his new partner Dan Cleary (Ato Essandoh), Tom starts his investigation by interviewing the premium suspect, Will, and seeing if they had gotten into any arguments recently, or if she had any enemies. Will tells him about her ex-husband Sam (Karl Glusman), and how jealous she was that she left him for Will. This leads Tom to speak to Sam but also runs into another person of interest, Eli Phillips, someone who had a vendetta against Will and his mother Camille (Frances Fisher), who was responsible for foreclosing on his family’s house, leading to Eli’s parents to kill themselves. You can tell early on that they are being established as the sinister, mustache troweling villains, and to Fisher’s credit, she nails the tone needed to pull off this intimidating figure, pulling a lot of the strings behind her son’s life and her powerful company. Unfortunately, Timberlake is not able to match her, and instead feels completely miscast, giving work that seems like he is sleepwalking through.
The further Tom gets down the rabbit hole of this case, the more information comes out, leading everyone to be a suspect. While this might not be the most elaborate mystery we have seen, this film is at its most effective, as Tom enlists his fellow cops, and even Judy, to help him unravel the killer and their purpose for murdering Summer. In a role written by himself, Singer, and Benjamin Brewer, del Toro is so comfortable here, immersing himself into the quirky things that make Tom so unique, like his obsession with home renovation and his passion for line dancing on Saturday nights. These small details are just enough for you to buy into Tom’s journey throughout the film, but they come too far and in between, leaving a little to be desired and leaving a ton of room to explore the character that the audience has to make up in their minds rather than using del Toro’s incredible talent to showcase this character he created.
About halfway through the film though, this once promising debut starts to take a left turn, as the case is solved after a shoot-out that involves Tom killing the person responsible for the death of Summer. As he is on administrative leave for firing his weapons, corners are cut for him to get back to the force and starts to realize that the small little police department that he is a part of is far more corrupt than he could even imagine, putting himself and Judy in harm’s way, even around the people they think they know and could trust. The twists and turns the third act takes seem to come out of nowhere, not making sense for the world in which this thriller is based. Dream sequences, high conspiracy plot devices, fake deaths; everything but the clichéd kitchen sink is thrown to try to stick the landing and it sadly fails.
Besides del Toro and Silverstone’s committed performances (reuniting for the first time since 1997’s Excess Baggage, the pair really shines when they’re together on screen), the rest of the cast is delivering pretty standard, underwhelming work. This becomes apparent in the second half of the film, which examines the seedy relationships that lie among Tom’s inner circle. Character actors like Domenick Lombardozzi and Mike Pniewski are used as nothing but plot devices (corrupt cops, mishandling of evidence, dirty drug money) to try and steer the audience away from anything remotely interesting and towards something we’ve seen a dozen times before in a standard cop drama playing on basic cable. It’s a shame because from a direction standpoint, Singer, alongside his cinematographer Mike Gioulakis, is able to capture the cold, uneasiness that a film like this needs to really grab the audience’s attention. But from a script level, the movie folds in on itself, losing all sense of grounded storytelling, thus exchanging it for cheap thrills that lead nowhere.
Singer, a music video director who worked with artists like The Weeknd, Sam Smith, and more, does have the potential to become a good film director. His work on Lorde’s “Green Light” video only shows he has the vision and energy to bring us something special as he grows his filmography. But sadly, Reptile is an empty vessel lacking the creativity to elevate this first feature amongst a stellar year of directorial debuts.
Grade: C-
This review is from the 2023 Toronto International Film Festival. Reptile will be in select theaters on September 29 and on Netflix October 6.
Photo: Daniel McFadden/Netflix
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