R W
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Joined: 23/6/2006
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It’s been over twenty years since his terrific film debut Sex, Lies and Videotape, and over the course of director Steven Soderbergh’s career in which he has made a film (or two) once a year, he has decided to call it quits and move on to different things. As we wait for his made-for-TV Liberace biopic with Michael Douglas as the flamboyant pianist, Soderbergh makes his send-off from the big screen with a psychological neo-noir about medicated America.
With her husband (Channing Tatum) out of prison, Emily (Rooney Mara) is suffering from depression after a series of attempted suicides. Under the conciliation of her assigned psychiatrist Jonathan Banks (Jude Law), she is advised on taking a prescription for a new experimental drug Ablixa. Despite highly recovering from her anxiety, Emily is experiencing sinister side effects.
Working once again with screenwriter Scott Z. Burns who previously wrote the emotionally-cold global epidemic ensemble piece Contagion, what Soderbergh directs here is an intimate but more satisfying piece about a young woman who though is the heart of the film, ends up being the central mystery. With Burns’ cleverly-constructed script, the film is always unravelling as it starts off as a drama about depression and a discussion about various forms of medicine, but then suddenly a single moment occurs and the whole tone of the film shifts into something rather chilling.
As the mystery continues to unfold, the film does feel like Sex, Lies and Videotape but as a thriller. There are certainly moments that script-wise that take the film into generic genre directions, such as the inclusion of Catherine Zeta-Jones as Emily’s previous psychiatrist who becomes evidence of where the film is going. However at the hands of A-list Soderbergh, he keeps the film gripping and intriguing with his stunning cinematography and Thomas Newman’s haunting score.
Following her Oscar-nominated performance in David Fincher’s The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo, Rooney Mara continues to shine as she is a revelation here as the troubled Emily. It is a performance which is sympathetic, but fears that she might be scary subconsciously. Although part of the story involves the central marriage of Emily and Martin (a fine supporting performance by Channing Tatum), the true male star is Jude Law who is at his best in years, as the bland psychiatrist who makes one mistake and determined to regain his career.
If this is to be Steven Soderbergh’s last hurrah in cinema, then this would be a great way to go as Side Effects is an intelligent neo-noir which entertains with its mysterious narrative and performances.
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