Oli Welsh

It might leave audiences feeling brutalized, exhilarated, amused, annoyed, or all of the above, but will it leave them feeling like they want to drop a thousand dollars on a handbag? They will certainly feel like they’ve just watched a Gaspar Noé film.

It’s spiky, entertaining stuff, and although it’s played mostly for laughs and thrills, it’s a setup with real thematic teeth.

The dialogue (by Ritchie and three other screenwriters) is lumpy and unconvincing, but that’s not why anyone watches a film like this. It’s a romp, disposable but sturdily made, with satisfyingly blunt action scenes that have been framed by a true master.

When I say that Don’t Move is the modern equivalent of a Corman movie, that might make it sound more trashy or exotic than it really is. It’s not some future cult classic. But it is an expedient, efficient piece of filmmaking that does exactly what it needs to do, no more and no less, to exploit one great idea — the terror of being trapped in your own body, unable to move or speak.

In the strange and threatening moment it conjures up, Black Crab works quite well. The economical bursts of action are mapped out with clarity and bitten off with curt precision. The quest is simple and the threats are tangible. When Berg and his co-writer Pelle Rådström reach for something more, however, they just close their hands on air. Empty clichés abound.

Rubikon’s plot crash-lands while its sincere intentions are left spinning fruitlessly in space, looking for a way back down.

Pugh’s performance is enough of a recommendation to see this shiny, smoothly finished movie-that-feels-like-a-movie. The production design, costuming, and cinematography are ravishing, and wielded with precision.

Howard and Rockwell are both funny, charismatic actors, but it’s a struggle for them to build real romantic chemistry amid all Argylle’s layered artificiality.