Like the opening piano sequence that plunges us into its sun-kissed but sordid world, The Two Faces of January is at once perfectly pretty and inescapably dark.
The film fleshes out the story of Patricia Highsmiths 1964 novel about an American couples quickly souring vacation in Athens.
Kirsten Dunsts enviable on-screen wardrobe and the many lingering shots of Oscar Isaac and Viggo Mortensen add to the films dreamy aesthetic and serve to make the plotlines descent into darkness even more compelling.
Relationships fall irreparably apart and deception proliferates in scenes soundtracked by traditional greek melodies and characterised by an elegant palette of beiges and blues. All this ambivalence makes for a mysteriously seductive film.
In cinemas now
