Truth stranger than fiction
IN A world where people are begrudgingly confined to their houses due to a global pandemic, it would seem difficult for an audience in 2021 to identify with a protagonist living in self-imposed quarantine.
However, Anna Fox, the enigmatic lead character in Joe Wright’s The Woman in the Window – the muchtalked-about recent Netflix release – was able to capture this restless audience, with a deep dive into the psychology of entrapment, culminating in an ending that will knock your socks off.
Based on the best-selling novel by AJ Finn, The Woman in the Window finally hit screens after its release was stymied by repeated delays for three years. The psychological thriller directed by Wright (Pride and Prejudice, Darkest Hour and Atonement) stars Amy Adams as the agoraphobic protagonist Anna, a troubled child psychologist who shares an equal love for large goblets of wine and old Hitchcock movies.
Living an imperturbable existence, Anna takes to observing her neighbours from her window, taking a particular interest in new arrivals, the Russells: Alistair (Gary Oldman), Jane (Julianne Moore) and their troubled 15-yearold son Ethan (Fred Hechinger). After Jane comes to visit, the two women develop an unseemly friendship over wine. One night, Anna sees a violent altercation at the Russell house and witnesses Jane being murdered.
When she alerts the authorities, everything starts to resemble a fevered dream. The cops inform her that Jane Russell is very much alive and unharmed. The Russells insist Anna has never met Jane and the woman they present as Jane is a completely different person to the one Anna drank wine with.
Although the movie follows the path of a typical thriller – a spiralling protagonist on a winding road seeking the truth, all building up to a whiplash-inducing twist – it’s the film’s brilliant cinematography that’s the true charm. You’d be forgiven for thinking you were watching a leading Broadway show. At times, the clever use of lighting, the positioning of characters and a stunning monologue delivered by Adams could all easily have been part of a Broadway show.
The use of claustrophobic lenses and confined shots fuel the entrapment narrative and viewers are taken down Anna’s dark rabbit hole as her devastating truth is slowly unravelled. You cannot escape the sense of being in a doll house as the camera pans through Anna’s home or when she watches and runs commentary on her neighbours through one particular window.
This is Anna’s life, day in, day out … she just watches, too afraid to go out, but dying to know what’s going on. This is probably why Anna resonated with viewers. For the last year and a bit, we’ve also found ourselves bunkered down, confined to our homes, too afraid to step out … but still desperately wanting to feel a part of something.