Mark Reviews Movies: GONE IN THE NIGHT

Gone in the Night, Vertical Entertainment

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Review by Mark Dujsik | July 14, 2022

The answer to a mystery is important, of course, but the good news for screenwriters Matthew Derby and Eli Horowitz is that it's not the most important element of a mystery. Their Gone in the Night, also directed by Horowitz, creates an air of uncertainty that goes beyond what happened to a particular person on a particular night in a particular cabin in the middle of the woods.

That's the main question here, but it also raises some others about romantic relationships, the anxiety of aging, the fear of inevitable mortality, and the worry about doing something of some meaning with the time one is afforded. All the while, the script gradually pieces together a puzzle by way of various perspectives and timelines, and if not for the fact that the filmmakers botch the payoff, this material might have worked as a potboiler with a bit more on its mind than keeping us wondering about the end point of the mystery.

Instead, though, Derby and Horowitz provide us with a pretty good setup, an investigation that's both entertaining and thoughtful, and plotting that becomes gradually too confident in its ability to surprise—before that mistake of an ending, obviously. It's ultimately an unfortunate disappointment.

The setup involves Kath (Winona Ryder) and Max (John Gallagher Jr.), who have been dating for about a year. She's a bit older than him, and we eventually learn that they met in a class on hydroponic gardening. Kath taught the class, and Max wrongly assumed what he'd learn to grow.

They're quite different, these two. She's divorced, says she isn't interested in a committed relationship (although the impetus of the plot suggests otherwise), keeps a rather routine schedule, and sticks to the familiar and comfortable. He's less serious and more adventurous, which is why we first meet them on a spontaneous road trip to the forest. Max rented a cabin for a little getaway from the city, and there's some obvious tension or the potential thereof in some of tiny details of the pieces of the trip we do see (Kath drives the whole way, because Max doesn't have a license, and he can't decide on music, much to her irritation).

Some of this matters in the long run, since Kath eventually vocalizes that she isn't sure if this relationship was something real or just something to counter loneliness, insecurity, or some desire to feel a bit younger again. The relationship itself ends up in the past tense, because, when the couple arrives at the cabin, it's already occupied by Greta (Brianne Tju) and Al (Owen Teague). Al wants them to leave, but Greta insists the two stay the night. Feeling out of place, Kath goes to bed early.

In the morning, she finds an upset Al outside. He tells Kath that some sparks ignited between Max and Greta in the night. They ran off together.

The rest of Horowitz and Derby's narrative is kind of split in two—and then three. The main through line follows Kath in the days after Max left with younger woman. After realizing she doesn't know anything about Greta, Kath contacts Nicholas (Dermot Mulroney), the cabin's owner. When she finally meets him in person, Kath tells the owner what happened, and he's sympathetic enough to her pain and confusion to help Kath find Greta—and, hopefully, an answer to why Max left her without an explanation.

All of this is fine, occasionally considered, and even fun sometimes, as the unlikely detective duo track down Greta, commiserate over failed romances and getting older, and have some sincere talk about the worry of one's body gradually diminishing. For Nicholas, that might happen sooner instead of later, since he has an inherited a genetic condition from his father that causes catastrophe in the nervous system. The bond between these two is briefly developed but, at times, achingly genuine in its honesty and the perspective each one brings to the other. Ryder, as a woman desperate for some resolution and meaning even beyond Max, and Mulroney, as a man resigned to his fate, are strong, until their characters become overwhelmed by the plot.

The other through line isn't nearly as convincing or engaging, since it's entirely about explaining back story and hinting at what revelations are to come in the present-day narrative. In some flashbacks, we follow Max, who takes a playful critique of his manner and fashion sense to heart at a dinner with Kath and her friends. The information from these scenes comes piecemeal, as Horowitz repeatedly cuts just before introducing a new detail, some other character or characters, or exposition that brings us closer and closer—step by drawn-out and hastily ceased step—toward seeing the whole picture of that night at the cabin. At a certain point and on account of some increasingly blatant foreshadowing, most of the solution here is apparent well before the screenplay makes it clear.

There's still some surprise to the final answer of Gone in the Night. That's mostly because it involves details that, while within the realm of the ideas of this story, come across as silly on a narrative level and far too on-the-nose on a thematic one. The movie doesn't collapse just because of the climax, but it does confirm this story is better as a mystery than the method of its unpacking.

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