Is The Guilty a great film? No, not really. Is it a bad film? Also no. It’s a mostly fine thriller with a great performance from Jake Gyllenhaal, who also serves as a producer on the project.
Director Antoine Fuqua, known for Training Day and The Equalizer, imbues this film with similar energy, despite its relative lack of action. The film is also a remake of a 2018 Danish film of the same title.
The Guilty follows Joe Baylor (Gyllenhaal), a police detective put on desk duty as a 911 operator. One night, during a late shift, Joe answers a call from an abducted woman (Riley Keough), whom he becomes obsessed with saving. As the case unravels, so does Joe’s mental state as his past quickly catches up with him.
The acting is where this film lives or dies, as Gyllenhaal’s character is the only real character we see on screen, the only other developed characters being heard exclusively through phone calls.
Thankfully, Gyllenhaal kills it, as he often does. Even if his character is often unlikable and brash, Gyllenhaal makes the film watchable purely because of his presence and poise. A sometimes unlikable lead character in a film with only that one real character would be a death nail in pretty much any other situation. This isn’t the case here because the man knows what he’s doing; he has for a long time and can comfortably lead any film.
Even though Gyllenhaal is fantastic in this, he can’t change the script he’s given, which is often lackluster. The dialogue is subpar, and characters usually don’t act or speak like real people, aside from the central character. To be fair, I don’t know if this issue is a holdover from the original version or if something was lost in translation or in the change in culture. Regardless of the reason behind the film’s most obvious issue, the script is still a damper on the rest of it.
The Guilty also struggles with breaking the film's cardinal rule of showing and not telling, as the film almost exclusively tells the audience everything outright. There’s no subtlety. It may leave you in the dark for a bit, but the film will answer literally every possible question you may have while watching it by the end of its exceedingly brief sub-90-minute runtime.
Ambiguity and subtlety are things this film just doesn’t understand. Couple this with a tacked-on social message that’s about a year too late, and the film can leave a bad taste in your mouth.
As the film is told exclusively from Gyllenhaal’s perspective, it’s extremely contained and lacks any real action. The tension comes exclusively from the central character waiting for new information or answers alongside the audience, which the film handles very well. Regardless, it would’ve been nice to have left the call center at least a little bit: not necessarily to show the crimes, as that would kill most of the tension and ruin the twists, but to show the fellow officers and operators he’s often talking to. I’m not saying I wanted the film to be more like The Call, which it’s often compared to, but the appearance of some other faces would’ve been a welcome change of scenery from time to time.
It’s a real shame the majority of the talent in this film doesn’t get a spotlight, especially Ethan Hawke, Keough and Paul Dano. It would’ve been nice just to see these actors at least once in the film, even if just for a shot or two.
All in all, The Guilty is worth watching, mostly because of its brisk pace and relatively short runtime. It definitely doesn’t require a major, or even a minor, time investment. It’s a solid thriller with a great lead performance from Gyllenhaal, some fun (if somewhat predictable) twists and not much else. So, if you’re looking for something interesting to watch on Netflix while being able to check your phone every so often without feeling guilty, this film should fill that niche.
