Film Review – The Escape (2018)
Gemma Arterton is easily one of the world’s hardest working actors in modern cinema. Always attached to a plethora of interesting, smart projects, she has moved a million miles away from her pigeon-holed roles about a decade ago. After her small stint in Quantum of Solace, she made the leap to Hollywood but after starring in such duds as Clash of the Titans and Prince of Persia, she wanted to get back in touch with her passion for acting and hasn’t looked back since.
In her latest endeavour, Arterton stars as housewife and mum Tara who is slowly becoming disenchanted with the life she has chosen. She has two young children, both at school and nursery respectively and her “day-to-day” is a whirlwind of car trips, cereal clean-up and, if she’s lucky, a couple of winks of sleep. Her husband, Mark (a lacklustre Dominic Cooper), is the breadwinner in the house and makes a habit of bemoaning his work problems despite his continued success whilst Tara has given up her’s or indeed rekindling any small hopes she may have to find some new ones. Things are, for want of a better word, spiralling for her and she wants something, anything to shake her out of apathy and remould her life in a way that makes it rewarding again.
Written and directed by Dominic Savage, The Escape is something of a difficult watch, particularly for those who are parents themselves or indeed people who may empathise with the situation and decisions on show here. And Savage wants us front and centre to see just how things will unfold. Shot with an intensity that’s usually reserved for Paul Greengrass and Jason Bourne, we experience every inch of Tara’s struggle and conflicted feelings as she weighs up what she wants from her life. And with a large portion shot inside a home (apparently Arterton’s own mother’s) there is seemingly no escape for both us as an audience and for Tara as an individual.
This undoubtedly is Arterton’s show and it may well be the best thing she has done this far, and for someone who rarely puts a foot wrong, that’s high praise indeed. And the character here almost mirrors her own early career: after her dalliance with the world of blockbusters, she made drastic changes to focus on her craft with some no doubt telling her it was a mistake, but to rekindle her fires with writers and filmmakers, she needed change and has thrived ever since. Raw, honest and truly heartbreaking, Arterton is never better when portraying grounded, flawed characters and elevates the film to a truly brilliant level.
In one of the year’s more sombre and sobering films, The Escape is an emotional rollercoaster in every sense of the word with a story that is laid bare with no frills and an exemplary performance at its core. It may feel like a slog at times given the subject matter but the rewards are plentiful.
Scott J.Davis | [rating=4]
Drama | UK, 2017 | 15| 3rd August 2018 (UK) | Vertigo Releasing | Dir. Dominic Savage | Gemma Arterton, Dominic Cooper, Frances Barber
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