Unsane is pretty bonkers but it is always compelling and it is certainly worth ninety eight minutes of your time. Most of the publicity around this film discussed that fact the director Steven Soderbergh shot the whole thing on an iPhone. This is worth talking about as it gives the movie a very particular look and feel but more interesting is the story and central performance. Ex-monarch Clare Foy, currently excelling on cinema screens as the first lady in First Man, plays a young professional who goes to a counsellor following an extended period in which she was preyed upon by an obsessive stalker. Rather than getting some calming advice though she is committed to a high security mental institution as part of what she believes is an insurance scam. She insists to everyone that she’s not crazy but of course that is what the patients all say. This is quite a frightening idea as she fights to retain her liberties and agency and we have seen this before in lots of things from Netflix’s MCU Iron Fist series to One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest. The extra level here though is that the guy who has been following and threatening her turns up as one of the staff. Or does he?
Foy is brilliant and if anyone who knows her from her period dramas is worried that she won’t make a good Lisbeth Salander in this month’s The Girl in the Spider’s Web, they won’t be after this.
Unsane is available for home viewing.
I personally felt a bit let-down after watching the film. I dunno, I guess I expected more thrill from it? Or maybe I expected it to go longer before the truth was revealed? I dunno.