A Study of Guilt

Rating: 8/10 (27 March 2006)

This is a creepy film, but as a psychological drama and a study in the devastating effects of guilt, it is absorbing. How many other lead actors would lose sixty pounds from their normal weight and look as bad as a Holocaust survivor just for a movie role? That's dedication, although obviously, going to such lengths unnecessarily is ill-advised. It is interesting the way Trevor gradually deduces who it is that is screwing around with his mind and his life, blaming first one person and then another. The best scene was when he suddenly suspects that his hooker girlfriend, Stevie, must be the guilty party and he confronts her in the kitchen. Sobbing, sarcastic, and resentful, he looks absolutely pathetic. After I saw this thing, the possibility that I, too, might have done something bad that I can't quite remember was swimming around my addled brain. In a weird way, I enjoyed the troubling sensation. This is a good movie and well worth a look. Expect, however, to be disturbed by it.