Review - Nocturnal Animals (2016)

Revenge redefined.

Tom Ford's Nocturnal Animals is a peculiar, yet a beautiful film. It reflects on a heavily overused theme - revenge - and yet, its unique treatment makes it entirely fresh and deeply relevant. In his second outing as a film director, Ford's skill to develop a film as an art form has honed immensely, and also as a writer, he did a remarkable job of adapting a notoriously complex book (Tony and Susan, Austin Wright) with all its layers and twists. He certainly does have a retirement plan after his lucrative career in fashion designing.

Susan (Amy Adams) is forty-something uptown art gallery owner in Los Angeles. She is unhappily married to Hutton Morrow (Armie Hammer), a failing businessman who  is cheating on her. One day, she receives a manuscript of a novel called Nocturnal Animals, written by her estranged ex-husband Edward Sheffield (Jake Gyllenhaal). Susan dated Edward during graduate school, and her marriage to Edward was short-lived and turbulent. Surprised by the unanticipated contact and equally unexpected dedication, Susan starts reading the novel as her lonely despondent life carries on.

In the novel (we see the novel unfolding onscreen), Tony Hastings (Jake Gyllenhaal) embarks on a midnight trip through West Texas with his wife and teenage daughter. En-route, they stumble across a car driven by hooligans. An unfortunate accident takes place which leads to a disturbing turn of events - Tony is brutally beaten up and his wife and daughter are raped and murdered. Deeply shaken, he becomes depressed because he was unable to act in the moment and protect his family. Police gets involved and no-nonsense detective Bobby Andes (Michael Shannon) starts working on the case as Tony plans his revenge.

Nocturnal Animals plays out as a film within a film. In the first half, the secondary plot of Tony Hastings sometimes feels off and out of tone with primary story-line of Susan, but by the second half, both the plots deeply echo each other and the finale makes a brilliant thematic intersection between them. Although on surface, both may feel different, but deep down they are perfectly coherent. Tony embodies Edward - that's obviously clear - but what's even more interesting, is that at many times during the film, both Susan and Tony seem to be in same state of mind. Ford has intricately written his film which brings out the interconnections between the both factual and fictional characters, which is outstanding.

Technically and aesthetically, Nocturnal Animals is beautifully realized. The sets, the locations, the costumes - are all beautiful but everything is in accordance with the script (even Aaron-Taylor Johnson's ruffian look is realistic). Unlike A Single Man, Tom Ford's previous cinematic venture which was heavily stylized, this film is a lot more grounded, even if it is set in art background. A quick mention must be given to Abel Korzeniowski, whose score channels Bernard Hermann's classical compositions which brings a certain eeriness to the film.

"When you love someone you have to be careful with it, you might never get it again." The essence of Nocturnal Animals can be summed up with these two lines - your choices in your relationships are extremely crucial. One wrong step, you'll regret it for your entire life. Who knows, at a certain point in future, you might feel that you have made a mistake, that you want to back track and get it again. But you never get it back. Nocturnal Animals' final act puts a new twist in the idea of revenge, a revenge which inflicts no physical harm but an everlasting bruise on your soul.

3.5/5