Last Night in Soho

Killing Two Birds with One Stone

or

Who Are you Wearing?

 

Edgar Wright's new film, Last Night in Soho, is his first horror/thriller film where the purpose isn't to make fun of them, where the emphasis is on the disorientation and not the whimsy (but don't worry, there are a lot of cheeky touches to it).

 

In it, a mousy fashion-design student, Eloise (Thomasin McKenzie—from Jojo Rabbit) moves to the big city of London to attend classes and achieve her goals of becoming au courant. But, as her grandmother (Rita Tushingham !!) warns her "London can be a lot." 

 

That it can be. Even in one time-line. Eloise has a rough first day, what with meeting her room-mate and a coven of snarky "mean girls" who occupy her dorm. It's tough on Eloise, who misses her Mum (she'd committed suicide when Eloise was a girl, but kept seeing images of her in the mirror back home). Finally, she decides to rent a room in Soho from Mrs. Collins (Diana Rigg !!) who's been there forever and wouldn't think of selling the place—"Too many memories".  That should have been put in the advert.

Eloise loves the place, seeing as she's obsessed with the 1960's. She's constantly spinning the old EP's—traveling, she takes an over-loaded suitcase and a record-player—and her fashion-sense runs to the eye-popping 60's. It's the place she'd most like to go-go. But be careful what you're wishin' and hopin' for. She goes to sleep with the neon buzz of the "Soho" sign right outside her window, and with the R.E.M blink of an eye, she finds herself back there, to find a world still fruging and twisting and swinging.

There's one little hitch, though. When she looks in the mirror—or any reflective surface—she sees somebody else's reflection, a woman who turns out to be named Alexandra (Anya Taylor-Joy)—"Call me Sandy"—an aspiring singer-dancer who wants to be the "next Cilla Black." Eloise and Sandy are tied to each other as they roam around the "Cafe de Paris" separated only by a silvered plate of glass, as Eloise watches her make her way through the club, fending off would-be suitors until finally latching on to Jack (Matt Smith), the loungiest of lounge-lizards, who promises to get her into "the business."

But, as Eloise witnesses whenever she goes to sleep, the path of success is littered with slimy, handsy men making promises and repeated pick-up lines that end up in disappointment and being used. As the old saying goes "nostalgia isn't what it used to be" and Eloise finds these visions only adding to her "outsider" stress and fears about life in the big city. Could Alexandra's cautionary tale be something that Eloise is inextricably tied to? And when that tale leads to murder is there anything she can do from being drawn into that fate?

Wright's ability to use effects and imagery are magical here—at times, in a moment's flash, Alexandra becomes Eloise and vice versa—so, one has to keep on one's toes, and the soundtrack is filled with a British Invasion of hits commenting slyly on the action going on-screen. The relationship between the two women is the strongest of the ones on-screen and Wright's tricks to achieve the doppel-ganging leave you utterly convinced, as things get darker and darker and darker.

One wishes the ingenuity required to pull it off extended to the screenplay. Oh, there are clever touches in the details throughout, and one sits on the edge of one's seat, anticipating the next twist. But, the longer the film goes, the more one realizes that time is slipping away, and Last Night in Soho feels longer than it's less than 2 hour running time would suggest—lately I've been seeing things with much longer lengths that seemed to zip by far more quickly. Perhaps there are one or two too many red herrings crowding the narrative—at one point, I was losing any sympathy for Eloise when a "what is she concentrating on them for" question crept in and lodged in my skull. Ultimately, it's merely a diversion, although it's rather short-lived (but then what do you expect in a thriller/horror film?).

But, it put enough doubt in my mind to make me question exactly what Wright was trying to say in this movie. Horror films, have—at their slimy core—some caution, some elemental lesson, that they're preaching in the most ghastly way. Is Last Night in Soho a plea to live in the moment? That seeking revenge against one's oppressors is a fool-hardy act? That victims can be just as dangerous as the ones who attack? Lord, I hope not. I just wish the intellect that kept the threads of who's who had been used to clearly say what's what. I was disappointed and somewhat appalled.