Film Review: The Girl on the Train

Critic John Berger is known for saying that, “Men look at women. Women watch themselves being looked at.” The quote continues, “A woman must continually watch herself. She is almost continually accompanied by her own image of herself.” Both thoughts apply to The Girl On The Train, Tate Taylor’s adaptation of Paula Hawkins’ bestselling psychological thriller.

Rachel (Emily Blunt, beautifully broken) is a depressed alcoholic whose divorce has left her sickly envious of loving couples. Her pain manifests as an obsession with her ex-husband Tom (Justin Theroux, stilted), his new wife, Anna (Rebecca Ferguson), and their beautiful neighbours, Megan and Scott (Haley Bennett, Luke Evans). Watching them from her daily train commute, Rachel learns what all melodramas are made of: when lives interconnect, sex and murder must occur.

Rachel’s preoccupation with Anna and Megan is a distinctly feminine form of aspirational envy that mimics attraction. The voyeuristic nature of her gaze is echoed in the way that men and the camera stare at Rachel: too close and too long. Invasive close-ups capture Rachel’s beauty but also her blotchy skin and eyes that struggle to focus through a haze of booze, smudged eyeliner and overflowing grief. The unnerving iciness of this gaze is echoed in the film’s coat of grey mist, the glint of steel tracks and the quiet screams of passing trains.

The subtle power of the direction and underlying themes is however subverted by the trashy late-night absurdity of everything else. Despite lengthy voice-overs used to evoke the book’s multiple first-person perspectives, every character besides Rachel remains a one-dimensional gender stereotype. Meanwhile, Danny Elfman’s anxious score proves overbearing from the first frame. Beginning as full-speed melodrama, The Girl On The Train finally runs out of steam, realising it has nowhere to go.