Psychological thriller and murder mystery “The Girl on the Train” by Paula Hawkins has been talked about by many avid readers since it breached The New York Times fiction best-seller list in 2015.
With such mainstream success, Director Tate Taylor decided to adapt the popular novel to a film, which was released earlier this week. Rotten Tomatoes gave the film a 45 percent while saying, “Emily Blunt’s outstanding performance isn’t enough to keep ‘The Girl on the Train’ from sliding sluggishly into an exploitative melodrama.” The book, on the other hand, was given a 3.9 rating out of 5 by Goodreads. So where did the movie go wrong?
Our heroine Rachel, played by Emily Blunt, is devastated by her divorce and spends her days fantasizing about a couple she sees on her daily commute. As the train goes by, Rachel sees a secret that smashes her perception of the seemingly perfect couple that live in the house by the tracks.
This secret leads to an entangled web of lies, deceit and mystery, which leads Rachel down a rabbit hole of questions and accusations. On her quest to find who is guilty and who is innocent, she finds that not everyone is who they seem.
The novel successfully navigates between three different stories from three different characters’ points of view, which continuously keeps readers on their toes.
However, the movie didn’t seem to pull this off as effortlessly. According to Rachel Fowler, a senior radio, television and film major, the film was a little hard to keep up with for those who didn’t read the book. “I was lost at times,” Fowler said. “The transitions let you know when you were going back in time, but not when you are back to the present. It kind of felt like they were trying to be ‘Gone Girl,’ [but] they just didn’t do as good of a job.”
Personally, as someone who has read both the novel and watched the film, I favored the novel.
The book brought great depth to each of the three characters it was centered around, a depth that didn’t seem to transfer to the film. Understandably not everything from a book can be transferred to film, but by cutting out certain scenes and nuances, some characters lost detail and motivation which made the film feel overdramatic. But alas, according to The New York Times, “The Girl on the Train” is a preposterous movie, but not an unenjoyable one. So, venture on at your own risk, moviegoers.