Believe Ripley Gets Meta: Talent for Murder’s Origin Takes a Risky Turn | Review
Highsmith Meets Her Editor
In early 1995, Patricia Highsmith lives alone at her Swiss country home, surrounded by weapons and other dangerous objects. Edward Ridgeway, a young editor sent from New York, arrives hoping she will agree to write a sixth Tom Ripley novel.
Ridgeway admires Highsmith and sees the project as a chance to advance his career. But a previous editor sent on the same mission has disappeared, and Highsmith greets Ridgeway with insults and threats before gradually considering a return to writing.
Fiction Blurs With Reality
As Highsmith and Ridgeway develop a new Ripley story, the film moves between their working relationship and the fiction they create. In that imagined plot, Ripley, played by Ehrenreich, plans to marry Clementine, an American heiress portrayed by Olivia Cooke.
Clementine resembles a young woman Ridgeway encountered on his journey to Switzerland. The overlap between the invented plot and the characters’ real lives makes motives and events harder to distinguish, while the story raises questions about who is manipulating whom.
Mirren Leads A Risky Film
Mirren plays Highsmith as deliberately abrasive, far removed from the poised roles for which the actress is known. Her performance includes provocative remarks, unruly behavior and reflections on the experiences that shaped both the author and her creation, Tom Ripley.
The film combines an eccentric literary portrait with a pulpy mystery, but does not fully achieve the sleek suspense it seems to pursue. Its third-act twist shifts the story toward the artist’s relationship with life and work, a choice the review suggests could leave viewers either pleased or angry. Ehrenreich, meanwhile, plays Ridgeway as an initially meek figure who hints at a more threatening side.
Key points
- The story follows a young editor seeking a sixth Tom Ripley novel from Patricia Highsmith.
- Helen Mirren plays Highsmith as confrontational and deliberately coarse.
- The film intertwines the editor’s experiences with the fictional Ripley story.
- A late twist turns the mystery toward questions about artists and their lives.