Review: Last Night in Soho (2021)

Edgar Wright’s latest film Last Night in Soho is a great opportunity to point out the difference between a psychological thriller and straight up supernatural horror. A psychological thriller is a movie that follows a character who is unhinged in someway and explores their psychology. Gone Girl is one of the easiest examples of this recently, where the movie follows Amy’s actions and the repercussions of her actions. A supernatural horror movie is a film where the entity that catalyzes the action comes from something like a ghost, the occult or a demon of some kind. Poltergeist, The Conjuring, Insidious and The Exorcist are examples of this.

After seeing Last Night in Soho, a movie pitched as a psychological thriller, it’s plain to see that calling it a psychological thriller is misleading. It’s not exactly clear why that is, especially considering the movie makes it abundantly clear within the first 10 minutes that Ellie (Thomasin Mckenzie) can see and communicate with ghosts. Not only does it explain that she can see and communicate with ghosts, but it is also pointed out explicitly that she has shared this communication with people in her life. Over the course of the movie there is no attempt made to make the audience think that the entities that she is seeing around her and in her dreams are anything but ghosts. This decision is important because it frames the viewing of the movie into one where the viewer is looking for a twist and looking for hints of what’s coming up, rather than allowing the movie to take them on the journey.

It is also worth noting that a lot of the decisions made around the plot of this movie, both in the order of events and how the audience is introduced to key concepts, players, and conflicts, are made without the greatest of care. Without spoiling the movie, it is easy enough to figure out what the climax of the movie will be without much thought. The movie is lazy when it comes to laying out the hints, certain characters have only a first name, some other characters have only a last name and others have no name. If a viewer has seen literally any movie before seeing this one, they should be able to figure out what’s going on in that regard.

The fact that the thriller aspect of the movie is so easy to follow works out in the movie’s favor to an extent because a lot of the plot points and character points are nonsensical. Because the movie keeps the viewer guessing in the most superficial way possible, it distracts from obvious questions. Most of these questions lay into the plot of the movie that would be best unspoiled if someone were to see the movie, but the first half lays out that Ellie’s mother’s death may have more to it than is alluded to, but that’s dropped after a certain point.

It would be easy to dismiss this movie entirely if it wasn’t visually and aurally stunning on all fronts. The costuming and set designs behind the 1960s-era London clubs is nothing short of impressive. The visual effects and direction that went into Ellie swapping out with Sandie (Anya Taylor-Joy) during a dance sequence in a club are only possible with a master director like Edgar Wright behind the camera. That said, these are all superficial visual flairs which would be better implemented in a better movie. It’s like if someone spends a day and a half creating fondant art for a dessert and then applies them to a kitchen sponge. It’ll look pretty but taste awful.

This movie is in a little bit of a weird spot because it’s not good in any way that makes it worth seeing in theaters. It’s visually beautiful and the audio mix and sound effects are top notch. Every member of the cast has achieved critical acclaim and they all do a great job in their roles. At the same time, nothing else about the movie works on any level. The movie isn’t memorable beyond the visual level so seeing it in theaters would be a waste of time and money. This is a movie best left to view when it comes home to streaming, which is unfortunate because usually Edgar Wright can deliver movies on a large scale that should be viewed in theaters.

Rating: 6/10