Title – The Woman in the Window (2021)

Director – Joe Wright (Atonement)

Cast – Amy Adams, Julianne Moore, Wyatt Russell, Gary Oldman, Fred Hechinger, Anthony Mackie, Jennifer Jason Leigh

Plot – Agoraphobic New Yorker Anna Fox (Adams) lives a secluded life stuck in her apartment afraid to venture out into the outside world but her quiet life is interrupted by her new neighbours across the street the Russell’s, who Anna believes are hiding a dark secret.

“Why not make today the day you go outside?” 

Review by Eddie on 21/05/2021

Filmed all the way back in 2018 and victim to subsequent re-shoots after middling test screenings and then halted by further set-backs thanks to everyone’s old friend Covid-19, Oscar nominated director Joe Wright’s big screen treatment of A.J Finn’s best-selling novel has finally seen the light of day after Netflix jumped at the chance to distribute this A-list infused thriller but like that empty feeling you get watching out your window for that package you ordered online to come only for it to never arrive, Wright’s film is a bitterly disappointing exercise that sees the colours of all involved lowered.

It feels horrible to bash a film with the always great Amy Adams in the lead role but despite her valiant attempts at bringing the tough to understand or like agoraphobic (hates outdoors) New Yorker Anna Fox to life, Adams can do nothing but slip into the background of an increasingly uninteresting thriller that tries desperately to be a modern day Rear Window only to fail in all ways, as Wright loses control of his film and his audience as Woman becomes a film that makes little sense and completely misses the mark when it comes too making us care.

Initially very early on we are lulled into a false sense of what might lay in store for us as we are introduced to the sad apartment bound life of Fox who lives out her days watching her neighbourhood and spending time with her cat but once her new neighbours the Russell’s move in, Fox’s life takes a turn for the more eventful as she suspects not all is as it seems with her idealistic seeming new acquaintances, but very quickly the film gives way to insane plot developments and scenarios and therefore gives its viewers very little too hold onto in the way of a meaningful reason too care.

In many ways both in an energy sense and execution sense this is Joe Wright’s poorest film yet in a career that has had a few downs but also a few big ups and its odd to think a director that bought so much to films like Hanna, Pride and Prejudice and Atonement could bring so little to a potentially pulpy good time thriller and his poor work behind the camera is reflective in front of it with a name brand cast like Gary Oldman, Julianne Moore and Anthony Mackie all unable to do anything but be participants in a mismanaged affair that is neither thrilling or mysterious.

With Netflix jumping in to save the film from likely further obscurity since its troubled foundation set it on the path to failure, we can at least be thankful we were saved from a trip to the cinema under the false pretences of an A-grade thriller featuring some of Hollywood’s most reliable citizens as we can now fall safely asleep on our coaches at home with no cost to bare as we forget the wasted potential of a film that promised a lot and delivered very little.

Final Say – 

A heartless and dull exercise that neither gets the pulse racing or brain ticking over, The Woman in the Window should’ve stayed inside as there’s unlikely to be many fans it encounters out here in the great wide world.

1 garden tool out of 5