MAGPIE - Mark Reviews Movies

Magpie, Shout! Studios

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Review by Mark Dujsik | October 24, 2024

Here's a nifty thriller that plays in such a subdued register that we might not notice the mechanics of the plot at work. Indeed, Magpie is a clever piece of sleight of hand on the parts of director Sam Yates and screenwriter Tom Bateman, who keep the focus on the characters, their obvious frustrations, and their blatant deceptions. The whole time, though, something else is at play, and that's probably all that should be said on that front.

On the face of the story, we meet Anette (Daisy Ridley) and her husband Ben (Shazad Latif). The couple live in a remote country home with their two children, young Matilda (Hiba Ahmed) and a newborn son. It's all happiness for about five minutes of the story, as Matilda auditions for a role in a movie being shot in the area and the girl's parents are thrilled when their daughter is cast.

The fraying ends of Anette and Ben's marriage, however, are pretty obvious as soon as it's time for the production to start. Anette has a meeting with her former boss on the day shooting begins, and the night before, a distracted Ben can only offer that the suit she's thinking of wearing looks a bit "butch." His attention is taken away from his wife and her anxiety about the meeting by a news story about the leading actress of the movie Matilda will be in.

Alicia (Matilda Lutz), that actor, is in a private video that was leaked by some caddish boyfriend. Ben's not especially sympathetic about the poor woman's betrayal by partner, and Anette sets her husband in his place, asking him to wonder how he'd feel if a sister or daughter of his was in the same situation.

That bit is more important than it might seem, since Ben, an author who has been between books for a while now, meets Alicia while accompanying Matilda on set. He's instantly smitten, although he probably was while watching that video of Alicia in an intimate moment online. The actress is a kind person, speaking to a nervous Matilda on the girl's level and trying to alleviate her worries, but Ben's mind seems to be at work with something else entirely from the moment he meets Alicia.

Meanwhile, there's poor Anette, who has been excited to talk to her old boss, presumably about returning to her job at a publishing house. She left after Matilda was born to become a full-time mother, and then, she had another a child with Ben, meaning that she's right back into that role. Anette feels more comfortable going back to work, since the couple hired a nanny to help with the baby, but just before Ben and Matilda leave for the movie shoot, he casually drops that he fired the nanny, leaving Anette to bring a baby with her to the meeting. It doesn't go well, obviously, because she doesn't even have a chance to ask about the possibility of returning to her job.

Bateman's script gives us both Anette and Ben's perspectives on this situation. For Ben, it's spending his day on the production, officially keeping an eye on his daughter but really watching Alicia with hungry eyes. It seems innocent enough at first, but the fact that Ben uses his wife's line about a sister or daughter on a couple of crew members, who are watching that leaked video in Alicia's presence, certainly tells us something about him. He's a smooth operator in his mind and a master manipulator from our perspective—or so it would seem, at least.

The relationship between Ben and the actress escalates to some extent, as the two share a private moment together, with Matilda asleep between them, at her place. She explains how it feels for that betrayal to become so public, and he mentions that his wife is unwell with some vague mental health issue.

That second part might be true for all we know, since the other half of the story follows Anette at home, becoming increasingly frustrated with being left alone with the baby and away from her husband and daughter. Ridley's performance is all internalized disappointment and irritation, constantly rising beneath the surface and being kept at bay. We're never completely sure if this is simply the regret and dissatisfaction of a woman who didn't think her life would turn out this way or if it's something else—something as suggested by Ben.

Either way, Anette catches on to her husband's infatuation with the actress, as she finds him looking at photos of Alicia—and more—online and learns that the two have started texting each other. How will she react? What will she do?

Those seemingly simple questions don't have simple or predictable answers, because the filmmakers really do put us right in the middle of this conflict, with only our ability to read these characters' actions as the means of determining who they are, what they want, and how they'll go about trying to accomplish those goals. It is technically a thriller, since there's suspense in not knowing how far Anette and Ben will take their respective plans—with Ben clearly trying to start an affair with Alicia and Anette attempting to get in the way of it.

The whole of it, though, is in observing and learning about these two by way of those deeds, and isn't that at least as exciting as a thriller based in elaborate machinations of plotting—if not more so? The characters matter in Magpie—so much so that, when it's revealed how many gears were turning right in front of us, it's a wicked and thoroughly satisfying shock.

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