‘Reptile’ Movie Review: Benicio Del Toro Dominates This Moody, Offbeat Procedural
Photo from Netflix
From Jeremy Kibler
A slightly offbeat, highly watchable procedural and character study with a fantastic cast, Reptile only invites comparison to David Fincher’s Gone Girl and Denis Villeneuve’s Prisoners at the onset. Music video director Grant Singer makes his feature debut, working from a script he co-wrote with Benjamin Brewer & Benicio Del Toro (who stars), and it’s that kind of collaboration that makes this layered slow-born more than just another standard-issue policier. Reptile is a cold-hearted snake of a movie that, in spite of some familiar plotting, rarely ever loses its grip.
The film begins with wealthy real estate agent Will Grady (Justin Timberlake) and his girlfriend, Summer Elswick (Matilda Lutz). Like any couple, they have their ups and downs. One evening, Summer texts Will to come to the house they’re showing, only for Will to find her upstairs brutally murdered. Investigating the case is Tom Nichols (Benicio Del Toro), who’s found a fresh start in New England, and this case is bound to impact his personal life more than the rest.
The main focal point is Tom Nichols, and Reptile sometimes works best as a showcase for Benicio Del Toro. Always reliable as a compelling screen presence, Del Toro is excellent here, internalizing a lot as an experienced detective might but also bringing an understated eccentricity (sometimes with just his eyes). Del Toro and Alicia Silverstone have an Excess Baggage reunion playing husband and wife who are in the middle of a kitchen renovation (there is a weird but amusing gag involving a sensor faucet fixture). The two have a lovely way with each other, and Silverstone gets to be a little more than the obligatory wife, proving Judy’s know-how with being a detective’s wife for so long and giving him insight into what she thinks.
The supporting cast is rich with shifty characters and red herrings, including Karl Glusman, Michael Pitt, and Frances Fisher, but the majority—Eric Bogosian, as Nichols’ captain; Ato Essandoh, as Nichols’ partner; and Domenick Lombardozzi, as a colleague full of bravado—feels like a fully realized family in the cop world. Justin Timberlake, who by now has no issue shedding that pop-star baggage, is very canny casting as a real estate agent who may or may not have killed his girlfriend; Timberlake is good enough that you’re never quite sure about him.
Even for a film that runs over two hours and doesn’t always feel focused in the final edit, Reptile still doesn’t have too many wasteful scenes or extraneous characters when all is said and done. Director Singer brings such a propulsive yet measured pacing that one can’t help but be enveloped in this untrustworthy world, and there are genuine moments of tension (including a possible nighttime home invasion in the Nichols household while Tom is out). Kudos to Michael Gioulakis’ moody, textured cinematography, and Yair Elazar Glotman’s unpredictable score, which combines somber, haunting notes and creepy, noir-ish menace, as well as needle drops of songs from the ‘70s and ‘80s.
As the title refers to someone shedding their old skin (and hiding dark truths), Reptile may not be as thematically challenging about the heart of darkness as it wants to be, but it has so much going for it otherwise. Alternately going where one expects and then zigzagging, this is a smart and darkly enthralling thriller.
Rating: 3.5/5
Reptile hits Netflix on Friday, September 29, 2023.
