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“People are desperate to tell you who they are. Desperate to be seen.”

Guillermo del Toro’s next project after his awards winner The Shape of Water naturally finds him in the neo-noir genre, something he’s dipped his toes in occasionally but not fully. I have to note that I haven’t seen the 1947 film starring Tyrone Power, of which this is a remake of. Basically, this is a neo-noir that stars Bradley Cooper as Stan, a carny who has a penchant for reading minds and ripping off people until he encounters a beautiful psychiatrist (Cate Blanchett) for he teams up with although he may not yet realize the danger he’s in… 

Although Leonardo DiCaprio was originally set to take Bradley Cooper’s role, I think Cooper turned in very solid work, as does the rest of the cast. Guillermo del Toro is as imaginative  m as ever as far as his sets go, along with his floating camera movement to further immerse any viewer but many of them might feel repulsed by a somewhat bloated runtime with threads that don’t really go anywhere. It feels like 20 or so minutes could’ve been easily cut for a more focused film but this was fine? I’m all in for del Toro’s take on the noir genre but I’m just surprised it came out somewhat bloated and just fine as a result? Oh and this is quite pretty to look at too. At best a rental.