Greta – Review

Greta is playing in cinemas now.

Neil Jordan (Breakfast on Pluto, The Butcher Boy and Company of Wolves) is well known for dovetailing adult fantasy/horror with contemporary social themes. However, with Greta, Jordan opts for a far more mainstream thriller/horror that delights in parts but struggles to maintain the tension of the first two acts as we near the third. Frances (Moretz) has recently moved to New York from Boston following the death of her mother. Here she works as a waitress while enjoying New York life with her flatmate Erica. However, when Frances finds a misplaced bag on the subway, her life is about to change forever as she returns the bag to a lonely widow named Greta (Huppert).

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Greta is bathed in moments of glorious tension built upon a Hitchcock-inspired style. Here Moretz and Huppert truly shine as their characters enter a deadly game of cat and mouse that twists and turns against a Manhattan backdrop. However, the glorious tension is ultimately let down by a finale that opts for mainstream horror. Here Greta is a film of two halves that fail to come together in the final cut fully. However, despite this structural weakness, Greta’s sublime performances keep you glued to the screen, providing an entertaining mix of thriller and horror that allows Huppert in particular to shine.