Sommerleigh Pollonais, Senior Writer
Plot: A rich divorcee named Chris Decker falls in love with a mysterious woman named Sky. She seems like the perfect woman until dark secrets are revealed and Chris is left fighting for survival.
Review: Last week I reviewed a thriller called Brazen where I talked about how little they pushed the boundaries considering their subject matter. This time the boundaries are definitely being pushed and the sexy is back, but was it enough to make Shattered stand out? The short answer is, kind of.
So let’s start with the juicy bits first. Lily Krug (Every Breath You Take) plays Sky, the story’s femme fatale, and she plays her very well. I couldn’t help thinking of early Sharon Stone while watching her manipulate her way into the bed and life of Chris Decker, played by Cameron Monaghan (Shameless, Gotham). She’s equal parts sexy and scary when things get darker, but she doesn’t quite have that je ne sais quoi that made Stone so iconic in Basic Instinct.
Monaghan is solid in his role as a young rich entrepreneur who has isolated himself from the world, to his own detriment. To be honest he might be a bit TOO good for a role like this as anyone who’s seen him in Shameless or his Joker-esque role in the television series Gotham knows Monaghan is quite talented.
Frank Grillo is a man I fell in love with from the get-go so I tend to be very forgiving (and biased) when it comes to his performances. His physicality means he’s equally believable as a hero or a villain (I leave it to you to figure out which one he is here) but don’t go in thinking he’s a major part of it as he only shows up in the latter half of the film.
Same can be said for John Malkovich, except he’s in the first half and way too talented to be wasted like this. Honestly, I think he was doing someone a favour because his role could’ve been played by literally anyone else.
The rest of this thriller, while never boring, is pretty much what you would expect. I give them points for not pulling their punches when it came to the more erotic elements as well as the darker moment, like when Sky goes all Annie Wilkes a la Misery on poor Chris. They set out to shock you with these scenes and I would say they succeeded.
There’s also a point made here about how disconnected wealthy people can be from the world around them as Chris meets Sky in a grocery late one night and immediately takes this stranger home for no other reason than she’s hot. The saddest part of that is I can actually see it happening (Men be thirsty) so I can’t even call this a lazy plot device.
Shattered gets points for tapping into that 90s thriller psychosexual vibe in a way more recent films pretend to do but are too afraid to really go for. Unfortunately, even with Lily Krug giving her all none of the characters here leave any kind of lasting impact with the exception of the stunning smart home Chris lives in (smart homes are fantastic until someone turns it on you) and the conclusion plays out like a paint by numbers of what to do in the final act of a thriller.
I can’t help but think if they embraced the crazy more and left the socio-political stuff on the cutting room floor Shattered could’ve easily been a fun return to the kind of sexy thrillers I devoured in the past.
Sommer’s Score: 5.5 out of 10
And you can check out more thriller content below:
Sommerleigh of the House Pollonais. First of Her Name. Sushi Lover, Queen of Horror Movies, Comic Books and Binge Watching Netflix. Mother of two beautiful black cats named Vader and Kylo. I think eating Popcorn at the movies should be mandatory, PS4 makes the best games ever, and I’ll be talking about movies until the zombie apocalypse comes.
Double Tap Baby!