The Guilty (2021)
Jake Gyllenhaal delivers another stellar turn in a claustrophobic, gut-wrenching thriller in close-up.
Night caller: Jake Gyllenhaal
As environmental catastrophe takes a more and more dominant position on the world stage, scant attention is given to the collateral fallout. The opening shot of Antoine Fuqua's gut-wrenching Netflix thriller is quite the eye-opener. Smoke blankets the core of Los Angeles as the surrounding hills crackle with fire. Over the soundtrack, as Marcelo Zarvos' urgent score intensifies, the sound of sirens, helicopters and 911 calls scream for our attention (“I need to get my kids outta here…”). The epic sweep of Fuqua's film has already made its point. We then cut to a close-up of Jake Gyllenhaal’s 911 call operator coughing his guts out in the men’s bathroom. An inhaler immediately establishes his chronic asthma – although this is the least of his problems. He is on the graveyard shift and the world has gone to hell in a handbasket. It is his job to take emergency calls, immediately assess any given situation and to send for help. But, inevitably, the emergency services are stretched to breaking point and Gyllenhaal’s Joe Baylor is forced to make a series of creative decisions on the spot. He must muster what data he can from a minimum of detail and mobilize the police to act on his behalf…
Jake Gyllenhaal is one of the most accomplished leading men of his generation, but in spite of an impressive body of work he is invariably overlooked at awards’ time. Here he is centre stage throughout, with penetrating close-ups picking up his every tick and bead of sweat. Piecemeal we learn that Joe has a court hearing the following day, has been separated from his wife for six months and is an emotional wreck. But still he wants to do the right thing, and in spite of a short fuse and an attitude problem, he is determined to save the day – or, in this case, the night. A woman, Emily, rings in to say she that has been abducted by a man and when Joe manages to make contact with the latter’s six-year-old daughter, Abby, he discovers that the girl is alone and very, very frightened…
The director Antoine Fuqua has made muscular action his hallmark, but never before has he worked on such an intimate stage. For those familiar with Steven Knight’s Locke (2013), they will know how an able director and a good actor can hold the viewer’s attention with just a close-up and a tightly written script. The Guilty is Locke with the stakes dialled up tenfold. In retrospect, it might all seem a bit much, but in the moment Fuqua and Gyllenhaal hold our attention with good old-fashioned spit and suspense. While it’s based on the Danish film of the same name (in its English translation), the film shares comparisons with the Kim Basinger thriller Cellular (2004), albeit with a more credible edge. We are certainly put through the emotional ringer and come to appreciate the psychological demands placed on an unheralded and invisible contingent of a much-maligned American police force.
JAMES CAMERON-WILSON
Cast: Jake Gyllenhaal, Christina Vidal Mitchell, Adrian Martinez, David Castañeda, and the voices of Ethan Hawke, Riley Keough, Eli Goree, Da'Vine Joy Randolph, Paul Dano, Peter Sarsgaard, Bill Burr, Beau Knapp, Edi Patterson, Christiana Montoya, Gillian Zinser.
Dir Antoine Fuqua, Pro Jake Gyllenhaal, Riva Marker, David Litvak, Gary Michael Walters, David Haring, Michel Litvak, Svetlana Metkina, Antoine Fuqua, Scott Greenberg and Kat Samick, Screenplay Nic Pizzolatto, Ph Maz Makhani, Pro Des Peter Wenham, Ed Jason Ballantine, Music Marcelo Zarvos, Costumes Daniel Orlandi.
Bold Films/Amet Entertainment/Capstone Pictures/Nine Stories Productions/Fuqua Films-Netflix.
89 mins. USA. 2021. Rel: 1 October 2021. Cert. 15.
