Enemy

2014’s “Enemy” by Denis Villenueve.

Starring Jake Gyllenhaal, Melanie Laurent, Sarah Gadon, and Isabella Rossellini.

Based off of Pulitzer Prize winner for literature winner Jose Saramego’s novel, “The Double”, in his second English film Veillenueve shows off his suspense building talents around the twisting narrative adapted by Javier Gullon.

Gyllenhaal plays a history teacher, giving lectures on dictatorships’ methods of control. He has a girlfriend (Laurent), whom he’s intimate with, but often won’t spend the night. On a recommendation from a coworker, Gyllenhaal rents a movie. He discovers a doppelganger of himself in the movie (Gyllenhaal again), and becomes obsessed with locating him. We then meet the doppelganger, an actor with a more assertive personality, with a pregnant wife (Gadon). Things become muddled, as both personalities alternate between anxious avoidance, and wanting to see what the other’s experience feels like. 

Those seeking an orderly and procedural exercise will be baffled by Gullon’s script, as “Enemy” takes the existential mind trip of “The Double” and recalls “Fight Club” by way of Hitchcock. Even the extremely warm tones of “Enemy” recall Fincher’s unnatural palette, as it is as yellow as “The Curious Case of Benjamin Button” is orange. Danny Bensi and Saunder Jurriaans’s score keep things anxiously alienating, and Toronto (actually playing itself for once) has never looked so foreboding (Look at that traffic on the 401!). Gyllenhaal puts in 2 solid performances, but neither 1 of them is particularly that interesting, especially when compared to the source novel. It is possible that the introduction of arachnids is intended as an explanation to the overall plot as well. While the adaptation lacks the novel's Dostoevskian psychology, and the meandering can be a trifle sadomasochistic at times, the creeping tone of “Enemy” makes it a friend of mine.

3.5/5

Trailer: Click Here.