3 Short Paragraphs: The Guilty

2021, Antoine Fuqua (King Arthur) -- Netflix

I watched this one because... well, Fuqua. I am of middle ground about the director. While I enjoy what he does, I more often don't end up highly praising the choices he makes with his movies. So many of late have been lacking. And yet, I will probably watch whatever he creates, as he is a comfortable old paperback of a director for me, familiar and easily digested. Meanwhile this is Jake Gyllenhaal not being safe at all, putting on his Producer suit (hopefully not purple), grabbing the rights to a 2018 Danish flick with a challenging topic. This is a pandemic film, a bottle film and one that doesn't shirk away from a white cop doing what we see white cops doing these days -- killing young black men.

Joe Baylor (Jake Gyllenhaal, Enemy) is an angry cop, a stressed out cop forced to work the 911 dispatch line while he waits for his hearing over a shooting. We learn he is likely covering something up, and the thin blue line is there to help him along. And then Jake gets that call, from the scared young woman who cannot give him all the details, abducted and within earshot of her abductor. So, as cop and as 911 operator, he begins to figure out how to find her and save her. And all of this is pandemic driven, almost single room, with few supporting cast members who are not just voices on phones. This is all Jake.

Redemption arcs. Maybe this is what the movie is about, but I saw it more about sudden realizations. Baylor is forced to be on the phone, confined to the actions he can take while on the phone, while he enlists other agencies to assist his caller, or calls in favours in order to get his own way. He is obviously a man used to taking things, and lives, into his own hands but it is the curtailing of that personality trait that allows him to come to a realization of his own failings. Gyllenhaal does a brilliant job of displaying the control, and the lack thereof. While I am not sure if the movie gave as important a window into the subject matter as it wanted to, it was still pretty decent.