Last Night in Soho (2021)- BFI London Film Festival 2021

Review

116min

Genre:       Drama, Horror, Mystery, Thriller

Director:     Edgar Wright

Cast:         Thomasin McKenzie, Anya Taylor-Joy, Matt Smith…and more

Writers:     Edgar Wright and Krysty Wilson-Cairns

-Synopsis-

A young small town aspiring British fashion designer heads to the capital and mysteriously drifts between the present day and the swinging London of the 1960s, where she forges a transformative bond with a mesmerising young singer, only for the glamorous mask of the West End to slip and the darkness beneath to blur the lines between the fantasy of the past and her present reality . . . with horrific consequences.

After spending nearly two decades working with Messrs Pegg & Frost to delight audiences by blending their favourite genres with plenty of charm and British humour, not to mention heading stateside to turn the video game ethos into romance and breathe new fuel-injected life into the heist thriller, Edgar Wright returns home and drastically changes tone to take a trip to the dark side—crafting an eerie fantastical peek behind the curtain of the swinging 60s and scraping the underbelly of London’s West End to reveal the dark exploitation beneath.

Thomasin McKenzie stars as young English country ingénue ‘Eloise’, a fashion student and aspiring designer with a 1960s obsession and a rare gift whose simple life takes a drastic turn when she heads for the bright lights of London’s West End, finding refuge with her new elderly landlady ‘Miss Collins’ (Diana Rigg) only to be mystically plunged into the neighbourhood’s past where she lives vicariously through aspiring young singer ‘Sandie’ (Anya Taylor-Joy) and her gentleman friend ‘Jack’ (Matt Smith). But the glamour of the era soon begins to slip for Sandie to reveal a darkness beneath, while Eloise is caught between the haunting dangers of the past and the struggles of the present, forced to unravel a morbid mystery before her own sanity slips and Soho dreams die forever.

From its game-changing music and revolutionary culture to its bold style, hedonist energy and general joie de vivre, it’s not difficult to see why the mid to late 1960s in America and in particular swinging London have long inspired feelings of admiration and nostalgia—even for those never close to personally experiencing the era—and it’s no surprise that it’s been recreated with gusto for the screen in styles which range from the sublime to the ridiculous. Now Edgar Wright attempts to simultaneously eulogise it while looking beneath the glossy surface of the time and place to tell a dark tale of hopes and shattered dreams, of violence and exploitation, wrapping it all up in a fantasy-infused mystery about identity and the roles we play to survive, while trying to tell a time-travelling revisionist tale of female empowerment—struggling but just about managing to weave them all together into a glossy waking nightmare which digs under the dirt of Soho’s sordid history.

It will come as no surprise that a film about a fashion student is impeccably styled and dressed to the nines, particularly in the past sections, as Wright and his production designers dress the real West End and use studio work to seamlessly re-create Soho and the surrounding areas of the late 60s including landmarks and iconic venues no longer with us, as the aesthetic then morphs into something darker and clearly inspired by the Dario Argento playbook as things get more morbid. The actors are immaculately dressed in period fashions ranging from the elegant to the colourfully flamboyant, bringing the 60s into the 21^st century. It wouldn’t be a late 1960s story or indeed an Edgar Wright movie if it didn’t have the music to match, so ‘Last Night in Soho’ is marvellously powered by a soundtrack of classics from the era plus a few lesser-known gems, including the 1968 song from ‘Dave Dee, Dozy, Beaky, Mick & Tich’ which inspired the story and after which the film is named, ala ‘Baby Driver’.

Without giving too much of the plot away, ‘Last Night in Soho’ is a story which tries to not only straddle genres but tones too, and while Wright tries to channel some of his biggest cinematic influences like Hitchcock and Argento when it comes to the film’s mystery/thriller and Giallo horror credentials, he’s also trying to weave together a stylised human drama centred on the abuse and exploitation of women and the roles they’re forced to play in society—leaning on the considerable talents and empathetic charm of Thomasin McKenzie at its core to sell the drama. But he and co-writer Krysty Wilson-Cairns go for a tad too much here, overstretching to grab a narrative coherence that’s just out of reach and an emotional impact that’s not substantial enough.

In a bid to reflect a prevailing grass-is-greener view of the past, Wright initially presents the late 60s as a rose-tinted escape for Eloise, before subverting it for her and the audience by turning it into a living nightmare. As it takes a turn into a neon-lit but dark sexual abuse and exploitation drama, then transitions into a time-hopping murder-mystery with a mild supernatural horror element, before a final twist into an unconvincing righteous revenge thriller, and then wrapping things up in happily-ever-after postcard style.

Despite being inspired by masters of horror and thriller, ‘Last Night in Soho’ only flirts with the masterfully orchestrated and stunningly realised thrills and terror which define its influences, capturing some of the style without boasting the narrative intricacy and only some of the atmosphere, even despite all the bells & whistles—and generally falling well short of the impact. It is at times violent, intense and haunting yes, but only as bold or daring as major studio filmmaking will allow, and that’s just not far enough if you’re gonna play with fire, which makes its UK BBFC rating of 18 more horrifying than the film itself.

Wright’s move into darker cinematic territory is a break from his bread-and-butter and his most grown-up film to date, as he ditches his frenzied pace, abrupt cuts and signature editing for something more measured but no less intense and more deliberately disorientating. But with few light tones and little comedic respite, and not much room for playfulness, the result is a rare thing indeed—an Edgar Wright film with little charm or personality.

‘Last Night in Soho’ undeniably has its flaws and they’re too deep to be easily tapered over by abundant style. But there’s just enough of a coherent albeit slightly underwritten story plus plenty of that aforementioned style and energy to make for a moderately thrilling and occasionally chilling, but most important largely entertaining genre-blending dark slice of homage-paying British cinema. It may not be Wright’s best, and it certainly isn’t his most memorable, but it’s still a dark trip worthy of the big screen experience.

The Bottom Line…

Edgar Wright’s stylish, tune-powered genre-straddling ode to swinging 60s London’s West end and dark mysterious plunge into its grim underbelly reaches for too much but just fails to triumphantly grasp what it seeks, relying on undeniable style and energy and a solid central performance to deliver two decent hours of dark escapism and a vibrant sensory experience which makes London town feel simultaneously glamorous and grim, but just failing to give us something to truly remember it by.

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