The toughest thing to accomplish in Hollywood is to translate great pieces of work on the big screen in the fashion that could lead to becoming a great adaptation.
The Girl on the Train is based on Paula Hawkins’ best-selling novel, it would seem like this story could lead to becoming somewhere in the realm of Gone Girl. Right off the bat, comparing The Girl on the Train to Gone Girl is like comparing Tom Brady to Muhammad Ali: It doesn’t match.
The trailers were very underwhelming and doesn’t leave an impression that this could end up being almost bland. What a dull movie this was. This story doesn’t go anywhere leading to suspense and melodramatic scenes that aren’t good or doesn’t make sense at first hand. This mystery about finding the whereabouts of this woman who gets stalked by looking at a train window doesn’t comfort anybody. What’s frustrating is that this isn’t a linear type movie to where it involves flashbacks sequences make this confusing when you don’t know if we’re back in the present. To a surprise it was.
Tate Taylor (The Help) was the wrong director to adaptation this on screen because his style of direction was so mismatched trying so hard to be like David Fincher. When translating the book to script, it must be executed well enough from page to screen can work. The screenplay has some terrible dialogue that almost felt like it came out of “Fifty Shades of Grey”. The way the characters speak is almost jarring. There are scenes where it wasn’t thrilling or that something happened and the audience thinks it funny.
Emily Blunt does give the only good performance, but the problem with her though is that you don’t like her character at all. She’s an alcoholic trying to regain her life trying to put the pieces together also but she’s just unlikeable throughout. It’s very slow almost leaving no tension that was brought to this.
Once the film eventually gets to everything leading up to some sort of twist, it was so predictable afterward with the last half is a case of eye rolling because of how everything doesn’t make sense when thinking about it. Shocking? 100 percent no. Overall, this was a mystery that progressed into nothing but felt like getting trapped on the train tracks while a train about to hit you.
The Girl on the Train tried like a Lifetime movie took Ritalin and resulted as a melodramatic mystery that isn’t thrilling whatsoever.
Grade: D+
DC's Take 