The actress Zoe Kravitz directed her first feature film, “Blink Twice.”
Critics have given the horror film favorable reviews, praising it for being superior to many of Jordan Peele’s knockoffs.
In “Blink Twice,” software entrepreneur Slater King (Channing Tatum) extends an invitation to two friends and cocktail servers, Frida (Naomie Ackie) and Jess (Alia Shawkat), for a retreat on his private island. Between daytime poolside relaxation and nighttime drug-fueled parties, the two started to notice that memories, items, and people were beginning to fade. They have a suspicion that nothing in their supposed Eden is quite as it seems.
The dedication to the both literal and figurative symbolisms makes “Blink Twice” into the masterpiece that it is. Kravitz uses all the resources at her disposal, especially an unsettling, uncomfortable approach to sound mixing, to craft both a disjointed first half and a taught second act that emphasizes the girls’ sense of helplessness. Like Spike Lee, Kravitz approaches filmmaking with the fearless abandon of an artist unwilling to hold anything back.
“Blink Twice” has a messy quality that makes the movie clumsy at times. Similar to another Peele film, “Us,” it places more emphasis on metaphor than story device. However, the skill and passion involved more than make up for its errors, according to the Willamette Week assessment.