The Pale Blue Eye (2022)

The Pale Blue Eye (2022). The Pale Blue Eye: Directed by Scott Cooper. With Christian Bale, Harry Melling, Simon McBurney, Timothy Spall. A world-weary detective is hired to investigate the murder of a West Point cadet. Stymied by the cadets' code of silence, he enlists one of their own to help unravel the case – a young man the world would come to know as Edgar Allan Poe.

“Without reading the book that it was adapted from, I can tell this was probably better to read than watch. I say this, mainly, because the gothic atmosphere was just enough. But I wanted more. I wanted to feel the dread that the setting and narrative eludes to. That feeling would come and go. Perhaps that had to do with the pacing, which matched the icy, winter setting. Though slow, it gave me the time to take in visual aspects of this film. I believe thatu0026#39;s one of the strengths that it has. Harry Mellingu0026#39;s abnormally sunken features played a role in the uneasiness I felt as viewer. I really wanted more of Poeu0026#39;s works, especially from the Tell-Tale Heart, to play a role alongside Bale and Melling. I was excited to hear that heart beating under the floorboard. But it never came.”