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'Side Effects' tells haunting tale
Rooney Mara and Channing Tatum star in director Steven Soderbergh's self-proclaimed final feature film. Photo courtesy of Open Road.
By Anthony Tosie, atosie@starlocalnews.com, @anthonytosie on Twitter
Director Steven Soderbergh has been a Hollywood mainstay for more than 20 years, although "Side Effects" is his self-proclaimed final feature film.
That's a shame, because Soderbergh is at top form in the film, providing a unique tale of a woman coming to terms with her husband's return from jail for insider trading.
Emily Taylor (played by Rooney Mara) struggles regaining her life when Martin (Channing Tatum) comes back into it. After a self-inflicted incident puts Emily in the hospital, psychiatrist Jonathan Banks (Jude Law) tells her to visit his office for therapy.
Emily's murder trial leads to questions about Ablixa, which has a known side effect of sleepwalking, and whether or not the drug is safe.
At this point, the film transitions perspectives from following Emily to following Banks, who's now seeing his world turned upside down as a result of prescribing Ablixa to the troubled woman. Because he was the one who prescribed Emily the drug, he's put under intense pressure by both the media and medical inquiries to determine if he mishandled the case.
As a result, Banks begins investigating the drug on his own, to the point that it harms his relationships with family and colleagues.
The film features strong performances and intelligent dialogue throughout -- but not to the point that the dialogue or situation becomes unbelievable. That's a credit to writer Scott Z. Burns (who previously teamed up with Soderbergh on "Contagion"), as his screenplay focuses on the human aspects of the story.
Soderbergh clearly knows how to work with Burns' material, using unique camera angles to show the impact of a main character's actions through the perspectives of those around him or her. His pacing also keeps the film interesting, providing a slow burn more akin to an Alfred Hitchcock thriller than most modern films.
Mara gives a terrific performance as the distraught Emily, constantly keeping the audience's attention -- sometimes to the point of being uncomfortable watching her life as it implodes. Law similarly has charm despite some of his character's glaring personal faults that are put on display.
If the sports adage about going out on top is true, then Soderbergh has nothing to worry about, having crafted a unique thriller-cum-mystery film that's both complicated and engrossing.
Soderbergh claims he'll continue to direct stage plays, television pilots and documentaries, simply retiring from feature filmmaking. That's hard to imagine given he's just 50, but if true there will be a serious lack of imaginative films in Hollywood.
4 out of 5 stars
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