‘Technology’s advanced incredibly, but emotionally speaking, we’re all still just cave dwellers...’
Polite society. Some might say it’s an oxymoron. Either way, the need to be ‘polite’ has a lot to answer for. Consider how often we do something we don’t want to do out of politeness. Annoying folks often proclaim themselves to be people pleasers when, in reality, pretty much everyone wants to please others in some small way. 2022’s Speak No Evil asked us to consider how far this insistence on being polite can go, and it did so in a brutally effective way. This American update takes the premise even further, albeit with a far less visceral and horrifying conclusion…
Ben (Scoot McNairy) and Louise (Mackenzie Davis) are an American couple living in London with their 12-year-old daughter, Agnes (Alix West Lefler). Whilst holidaying in Italy, they meet Paddy (James McAvoy) and his much younger wife, Ciara (Aisling Franciosi), and the two couples hit it off. Paddy and Ciara are much more outgoing than their American counterparts. Ben finds this exhilarating, so much so that he pressures Louise into accepting an invitation to stay with Paddy and Ciara at their remote farmhouse in Devon. While the first two-thirds of the film mirrors that of the original, the third act goes in a completely different direction.
It’s rare for an American remake of a foreign language film to surpass the original, and I would argue that this film doesn’t manage it either, but it does add a different twist to what was already an incredibly twisted film to begin with. It also boasts an utterly captivating performance from James McAvoy. Frankly… he’s fucking terrifying – partly because everyone has met a version of this man. Aggressively friendly. A master manipulator. Charming when he needs to be. There is one sat in every pub in every small town or village across the United Kingdom. The rest of the cast also excels, with both couples feeling lived in and authentic and McNairy providing the beta yin to McAvoy’s alpha yang.
Christian Tafdrup, the writer and director of the original film, criticised the ending to this version, and while it may not have the same visceral gutpunch as his film, I still found the conclusion here to be effective and suitably cinematic and it gives McAvoy a further opportunity to demonstrate how adept he is at playing crazy and that’s always a good thing. Director James Watkins has form in this area, having already been at the helm for 2008’s incredibly bleak horror triumph Eden Lake, and when things go south here, Watkins and his cast are not afraid to get nasty. A word too for newcomer Dan Hough, who brings a chilling humanity to Paddy and Ciara’s mute son Ant.
Watkins‘ Speak No Evil doesn’t hit as hard as the original version, but it does justify its own existence, and that’s really all you can ask from an American remake.
