A suburban woman fights to be believed as she finds herself stalked by a threatening figure who returns to her house night after night. When she can’t get help from those around her, she is forced to take matters into her own hands.
Ever since Jordan Peele brought us “Get Out,” filmmakers have been trying to snag some of that lightning in a bottle and Brea Grant/Natasha Kermani did it. The social horror has existed for longer than we think, but to capture it fully in all its glory takes a perfect culmination of thought, experience, talent, and determination. I found the central story of “Lucky” compelling and incredibly watchable. Brea Grant and Natasha Kermani will go down as filmmakers to watch out for. “Lucky” captures its own potent magic delivering a powerful feminist message in one of the best thrillers I’ve seen in 2021.
Brea Grant plays May Ryer, a self-help book author, down on her luck. After a bad meeting with her publishing agent, she comes home, goes to bed with her husband, and wakes up to a violent intruder. Each day she wakes up to the same intruder and even though she survives round after round, she feels herself going in circles, going crazy. The police are useless, her husband leaves her, and we start to question her sanity. I won’t say anything else since so much of this movie needs to be unpacked.
Brea Grant’s writing and acting are a masterstroke, forcing our alliances to shift. We question the laws of this film universe as they wobble, forcing us off guard as much as our protagonist. This running sense of unease permeates the movie evenly as May Ryer attempts to get to the bottom of this mystery. Why is an evil man attacking her? How come he disappears right after he dies? Why her? Who is it? The answer becomes unclear the longer we go on and we start to wonder who May Ryer is.
Grant’s desperation heightens assault after assault, but she still brings an undercurrent of determination to everything her character does. So much of this movie revolves around Grant’s performance it’s no wonder this movie is an instant classic. I am utterly ashamed to admit I didn’t see this at Fantastic Fest but Brea Grant deserves every accolade afforded her.
Kermani’s influence comes across as subtle at first but really flares in the finale. The whole film utilizes fairly naturalistic lighting, soft tones, and simple textures as its setting for most of the time. The camera levels perfectly and bobs in times of distress. Still, in a delightful fever pitch set-piece, Kermani goes all out with harsh blue lights flipping to red as May’s world comes apart. Even subtle effects like the walls cracking help sell the slow unraveling of the central protagonist. With level acting performances the dread’s much more insidious than lingering. It takes some time to truly get up to speed, but once it does this movie takes off at a full tilt.
I won’t spoil the ending, but the movie delivers a fantastic message by sticking the landing if a little heavy-handed. I am incredibly excited about this film as its hard message really comes across. Its Martha Stewart textiles never prevent it from feeling ominous and terrifying all at once. Brea Grant has struck gold with her story here and those of us itching for a poignant horror movie will be satiated.
Now available to stream on Shudder
