‘Strange Darling’ review: Willa Fitzgerald’s electrifying run elevates this subversive shocker

A still from ‘Strange Darling’
| Photo Credit: X/ @strangedarlingx

In Strange Darling, writer-director JT Mollner seems determined to take viewers down a twisted rabbit hole of subversion, tapping into both the psychosexual intensity of Hitchcock and the fever-dream aesthetics of David Lynch, all while standing firmly in the tradition of grindhouse horror. This isn’t your run-of-the-mill slasher, though — far from it. Mollner crafts a fragmented tale of bloodlust and manipulation, flagrantly tossing the presupposed conventions of genre and gender on their heads.

The film kicks off not with a quiet buildup but with a full-throttle chase through a mid-western field. Willa Fitzgerald’s mysterious protagonist, dubbed “The Lady”, flees in slow-motion, her bloodied body bathed in the melancholic strains of Nazareth’s ‘Love Hurts’. These continued cinematic flourishes scream Texas Chainsaw Massacre, yet undercut themself with the unsettling dreaminess of its contemporaries, like Mandy. Mollner doesn’t allow for breathers, immediately thrusting us into Chapter 3 of 6 in his nonlinear puzzle. Chronology is established as irrelevant, and tension simmers through the film’s fractured structure, teasing out reveals just as quickly as it veers off into new directions.

From the outset, Strange Darling pulses with anxiety. The film’s core duo, the Lady and her pursuer, “The Demon” (Kyle Gallner), are locked in a disconcerting bit of debauchery that quickly shifts between moments of pure terror and sparing bits of relief. The Lady may seem like a victim, fleeing for her life, but Mollner’s direction refuses to settle into such clear binaries. Both Fitzgerald and Gallner deliver powerhouse performances that toy with our sympathies. Fitzgerald balances her character’s vulnerability with a looming edge, while Gallner carries a disarming mix of small-town charm and brooding menace.

A still from ‘Strange Darling’
| Photo Credit:
X/ @strangedarlingx

Much of the film’s tension is heightened through its visual and auditory design. Shot entirely on 35mm film (a choice that Mollner feels the need to announce via an opening slate) by actor-turned-cinematographer Giovanni Ribisi, the grainy texture gives the film an eerie retro sheen. The camera lingers on wide landscapes and tight close-ups alike, transforming both into spaces of threat. Colours take on symbolic weight, with a recurring emphasis on red that suggests both passion and violence in equal measure. 

The sound design, however, isn’t as well-executed, and the film’s crucial early conversations are muddied by an imbalance that left me squinting for meaning. Though its intentions were presumably to disorient and heighten the mystery, it felt more like a technical oversight than an artistic choice.

What makes the film really stand apart is how it toys with expectations. Mollner knows exactly how we’ve been conditioned to make snap judgments about gender roles in crime and horror — and he weaponizes that instinct at every turn. The film teases you with questions you think you’ve answered (I won’t spoil the fun), only to yank the rug out from under you just as you’re settling in

.But as the layers of misdirection pile on, the intrigue begins to wear thin. The entire game hinges on one central twist and while it’s deliciously disorienting at first, once the rug is fully pulled, the narrative starts to lose a bit of its bite.

A still from ‘Strange Darling’
| Photo Credit:
X/ @strangedarlingx

Mollner’s taste for shock value also teeters uncomfortably close to gratuitousness. The Lady spends much of the film in various states of physical and emotional torment, and while the genre often thrives on discomfort, the relentless brutality begins to feel less commentary and more an indulgence in suffering. A late plot development involving a woman police officer also feels particularly misjudged, with a disturbing comedy of errors that risks pushing the film into dangerously misogynistic territory.

Still, despite its edginess, the film is undeniably stylish, and for fans of genre films that revel in artifice and unease, it offers plenty to admire. The film’s aesthetic choices, from its lush lighting to its serpentine editing, put Mollner’s confidence on full display. The film succeeds in creating a mood — one of oppressive dread and sickly seduction — that lingers long after the final frame.

In the end, Strange Darling stands as one of the boldest cinematic offerings of the year. Sure, it’s not perfect — beneath all the blood-splattered bravado, you might wonder if the plot’s substance fully keeps pace with its ambition. But in an ocean of cookie-cutter horror, Strange Darling is audacious enough to leave a lasting impression, even if it occasionally trips over its own self-indulgent shoes.

Strange Darling is currently running in theatres