Cooper\u2019s first image is a haunting one: a man hanging from a tree. The time is 1830 and the place is West Point, and the hanging man is a second year cadet who was not only killed, but whose body was \u201cviolated\u201d in the hospital ward; his heart was meticulously carved out of his chest. This all obviously looks very bad for the still-young military academy, whose powers-that-be bring in a former military man and detective, August Landor (Christian Bale), to investigate what looks less like a suicide than a murder staged to look like one. But he\u2019s kept on a short leash. \u201cThere will be no drinking throughout this investigation,\u201d snaps the short-fused Captain Hitchcock (Simon McBurney). \u201cYour reputation precedes you.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
As it happens, Edgar Allen Poe (Harry Melling) is a classmate of the young murdered man; a bit of an introvert, unsurprisingly, but keenly observant and obviously intelligent. Landor makes note of this young man and asks him to serve as something of an assistant in the investigation, nosing around in the less savory circles of the school and reporting back, while Landor examines autopsy reports, gathers clues, and assures his employers that he\u2019s very close as more victims turn up (as you know they will).<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Cooper\u2019s screenplay is adapted from Louis Bayard\u2019s 2003 novel, and both follow the beats of the genre, but not too strenuously; there\u2019s a shagginess to the picture, thanks to Cooper\u2019s irresistible pull to peculiar supporting roles, as well as Bale and Melling\u2019s lived-in characterizations. Melling is especially delightful, reveling in the character\u2019s tics and eccentricities; there\u2019s a wonderful moment when he\u2019s in Landor\u2019s home for the first time, catches a glance at the older man\u2019s library, and gasps, delighted, \u201cBOOKS!\u201d before rushing over to start the inquisition. Bale is working in a nicely muted key, particularly after the (appropriate) broad theatrics of Amsterdam<\/em> in the fall; he has a couple of beats in which he\u2019s forced to talk about his estranged daughter that invoke genuinely affecting pathos.<\/p>\n\n\n\n And the supporting cast is superb. I was just making a note of how many great British character actors are in the cast when no less than Toby Jones showed up; the performances are an appealing mix of stiff-upper-lip and roaring scenery chewing. Robert Duvall turns up briefly (as is his custom these days) but memorably as a kooky advisor, and he\u2019s a hoot (again, as usual). Gillian Anderson overdoes it a bit as a swooning matriarch, but Lucy Boynton, forever underrated, handles several difficult moments well.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Alas, Cooper succumbs to some of the punchy pacing that has troubled his previous productions – here, the agreeably bonkers mystery comes to an appropriately buck-wild conclusion, but then there\u2019s somehow 30 minutes left, and we realize this entirely satisfying effort is going to give us another, not entirely welcome twist. Nothing happens thereafter that sinks the picture – but there\u2019s a case to be made that\u2019s all epilogue, solid closing beat notwithstanding. Nevertheless, The Pale Blue Eye<\/em> is a sturdy piece of genre craftsmanship, and probably the most successful of the Cooper\/Bale collaborations to date. <\/p>\n\n\n\n “The Pale Blue Eye” is on Netflix Friday<\/a>. <\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/crookedmarquee.com\/stage8\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/01\/pale2-scaled-1024x683.jpg\")
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Cooper\u2019s regular cinematographer Masanobu Takayanagi manages to make the picture appropriately dark without succumbing to the flavorless muddy look of too many Netflix productions; it\u2019s all properly Gothic moody, full of whistling winds, scenes lit by lanterns, late-night bells tolling, and things going bump in the night. Yet daytime scenes are crisply captured, and the grisly crime scenes are rendered with enough\u2026 attention to detail to satisfy horror aficionados as well.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\nB<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n