Movies

Go behind the scenes of Blink Twice with director Zoe Kravitz and stars Naomi Ackie and Channing Tatum
Featurette: Amazon MGM Studios

Blink Twice
Directed by Zoe Kravitz
Rated R
Trapped 23 August 2024
#BlinkTwice

Blink Twice has a solid message involving social terror, it’s the execution that’s challenging to appreciate.

Foundational Feelings

In some respects, it hurts to not shower praises on Blink Twice. As Zoe Kravitz’s directorial debut, it is without a doubt an impressive accomplishment (she also co-wrote the screenplay with first-time feature writer E.T. Feigenbaum). It’s also timely in the wake of the Me Too movement, Harvey Weinstein, Jeffrey Epstein and NXIVM.

But there’s a trick to making this sort of material work with a larger audience in mind and that requires a little more setup before everything’s struck down.

In short, Frida (Naomi Ackie, who starred as Whitney Houston in I Wanna Dance with Somebody) and Jess (Alia Shawkat, Being the Ricardos) are best buds working a big gala event for the King Tech Foundation and its news fodder CEO, Slater King (Channing Tatum, Fly Me to the Moon). The movie starts with Slater issuing an apology via social media and other outlets. The details of what he’s apologizing for aren’t clear, but abuse of his powerful position is a part of the situation. He’s going to take a leave of absence from his company and fix himself. He’s sorry.

He’s really sorry.

Really.

Seriously.

Sorry.

He wants to do better.

He’s rich and handsome (and he’s sorry), so when Slater unexpectedly invites Frida and Jess to stay at his private island as part of that leave of absence, they don’t hesitate.

But that’s where the troubles begin not only for Frida and Jess, but for the audience as well.

Don’t Call Me "Babe"

The challenge is in finding a hook, a reason to care for any of the characters, particularly Frida and Jess, as they appear to excel at making bad decisions.

There’s a lack of suitable bonding between Frida and Jess (or with any of the other characters, for that matter) before they’re whisked off to an island paradise that features some strangely shabby lodgings and a garden full of vipers which keep the local staff busy. There’s an effort to establish Frida as a caring friend to Jess, with Frida practically begging Jess to not go back to her worthless boyfriend.

But that’s about it.

So, when Frida has the epiphany she doesn’t really know anything about the guys they hopped right on a plane with (with nothing more than the clothes on their backs) – and the painful revelation the other girls on the trip don’t even know each other, they’re all strangers – it’s slightly after the audience starts wondering why they’re drawn to this group of fairly sleazy guys with extremely short-term memory (one even forgets he met Frida within a mere hour or two).

But then again, that’s part of the unspoken narrative. There are drugs involved. Weed, sure. Champagne. It flows. But other products, such as perfumes in gift bags, are also laced with mind-altering potions. That concept works, but it’s also the movie’s crutch. When Frida starts taking shots of viper venom like it’s Tequila, that’s when things drift off course. The venom brings clarity, restores lost memories. The venom is the anti-venom for forgetting some horrific things, including the motivations behind this clique of rich and powerful men.

As Slater says, "Forgetting is a gift."

And with that, their cell phones are confiscated with the calm assurance nobody will have to do anything they don’t want to do. No phones, no photos to remember the events. But, of course, Slater has his Polaroids.

I Spit on Your Island

The mysterious drugs at play in Blink Twice make for a suitable cover for a number of narrative sins. But they also discount culpability and ownership. If the drugs aren’t problematic narrative "issues," they’re at least an easy compromise made in place of other opportunities that could make for a more engaging moviegoing experience.

One of the issues is Geena Davis (Beetlejuice), who, as Stacy, is a ditzy, word-slurring handler for Slater, his male friends and their dark manipulations. Thinking about Allison Mack (involved in the NXIVM/Keith Raniere scandal) and Ghislaine Maxwell (Jeffrey Epstein’s accomplice), it might’ve made for an even more disturbing experience if Stacy were young, sharp as a tack and fully aware of the evil afoot.

But the drugs can essentially relieve her of accountability.

Certainly, their unwitting (and unwilling) consumption by Frida, Jess and Slater’s other captivated targets, remove them from having accountability for their own actions.

Regardless, without a doubt, Slater and his friends are pure evil operating in broad daylight, even in the limelight.

At one point, one of the guys says, "We’re going to to go Hell."

To which another responds, "What do you mean? We’re nice guys!"

As the story unfolds and the evil becomes apparent, the movie explodes into a female-driven variation on the 1970s exploitation flicks that have been a source of fascination and inspiration for much of Quentin Tarantino’s career. But, instead of a bizarre rewriting of history, Kravitz goes for a twist ending. It’s not on the level of The Twilight Zone, and it doesn’t particularly work, but it does make for some good post-movie analysis over java (or maybe something stronger in the wake of all the gory bloodshed).

Red Rabbits

It all culminates with a final confrontation between Slater and Frida on the island. The bloodshed preceding it was cathartic for the female victims. The follow-up is a catharsis of words and who is to be believed.

Tatum stares into the camera and says "I’m sorry" a couple dozen times. In doing so, he brings things back to his mea culpa at the movie’s beginning: "I’ve said those words so many times, they no longer have any meaning."

That part is most certainly effective. And it calls to mind when Harvey Weinstein was whisked away in handcuffs and all he had to say was, "Second chances. Second chances." How many chances did the creep already get up to that point?

Blink Twice is a title change from what Kravitz originally wanted, but she acquiesced to negative reactions from a number of women. It’s a title loaded with irony; the concept of blinking twice if you’re in trouble becomes meaningless if there’s nobody there to blink twice at for help. And it’s fitting for a movie that calls out some of the hypocrisy of the entertainment business, including the exploitation that enters people’s homes virtually every day in the vehicle of reality TV.

Ultimately, the movie’s message is straightforward: believe the women.

That’s also where the twist ending doesn’t quite work. The movie could’ve used a little more coverage of the aftermath and the bloody devastation left on the island, not to demystify, but to add a grounded sense of reality and an acknowledgement of the damage done.

Nonetheless, Kravitz is bold and it’ll be exciting to see where this directorial track takes her career – and audiences.

• Originally published at MovieHabit.com.

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