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In recent years, movie audiences have fallen back in love with the whodunnit, thanks to the mighty talents of Rian Johnson and Kenneth Branagh and more. That the classic mystery subgenre would continue to stake its claim in the cinematic world is no surprise. When executed well, there’s nothing quite so fun as going for a ride that ends with a tidy, smart ending. This is who did the deed, and this is how they did it, and this is why.
Iconic novelist Patricia Highsmith was far more concerned with the final part of that particular answer. Why. The creator of Tom Ripley wasn’t very interested in untangling who — we always knew who! — but what made him (or her other, often less popular creations) tick. Whydunnit, as it were. And Highsmith’s own compulsion toward building twisted, twisty characters is given fresh life (new blood?) in Anton Corbijn’s clever “A Talent for Murder,” adapted by playwright Joanna Murray-Smith, who first constructed this slice of fiction for her play “Switzerland.”
Built on the barest of real facts — like that Highsmith was a prickly customer who spent her final years basically holed up in a Swiss home that people called “the bunker” — Murray-Smith spins out her own story of psychological trauma and maybe, just maybe, actual murder. Starring a wonderfully terrifying Dame Helen Mirren as this fictionalized Highsmith, the film opens with a clearly out-of-his-depth (or is he?) young editor making his way to the bunker in question. To the prickly customer in question.
Edward Ridgeway (Alden Ehrenreich) is, in fact, the young second editor dispatched to Switzerland to try to extract a final Ripley novel from Highsmith (the film was shot on location, and it shows). The first one, well, we’ll hear a bit more about him along the way, but suffice to say, their meeting didn’t end so well. Highsmith’s publisher is intent on getting one more Ripley hit out of the author, and if Edward can’t get her to sign a new contract? He might as well not come back. Slightly disheveled, a little shy, and obviously out of place, it’s safe to assume Edward might not be the guy for the job.
Highsmith (Mirren’s portrayal of the author, fictional as it might be, is still so mighty it feels wrong to call her Patricia, but we will try) feels the same way. Still, it’s hard to imagine who could possibly impress Patricia, as she rattles around her bunker (impeccably designed by Dimitri Capuani), smokes a lot, and grimaces frequently at her typewriter. That’s not to say that Patricia doesn’t know Edward, or expect him, or see through him. Mirren’s Patricia intermittently narrates the story, suggesting she’s creating Edward as much as she is receiving him. Why not both?
But Edward’s nerdy charm isn’t without some admirers, like alluring young Clementine (Olivia Cooke), who he meets on the train to Switzerland. (Yes, many Highsmith faithful will undoubtedly point at the screen when they first come into contact, all the better to point out these “strangers on a train.”) They meet cute and then meet again (and again), giving Ehrenreich space to build an impressively multifaceted character who seems to adjust to whomever he’s dealing with.
But the scenes of Edward and Patricia together? They’re the best, and the film is at its strongest when these two are going at it, trying to catch each other out, spinning tales to entertain and scare, and testing for weak spots. Patricia’s home is kitted out with all manner of deadly items: poisons line her pantry, knives and guns adorn her office wall, and there has to be something wrong with her aquarium filled with snails. But Edward, possessed of a tragic backstory and an iron will, isn’t giving up so easily. He’ll buy her a knife. He’ll eat a breakfast made next to a bottle of poison. He’ll get the girl.
Perhaps Patricia has misjudged him? Or have we?
Corbijn delights in showing us what to look at — Edward’s bag, for instance, or a ranting man in the airport, a knife or two, Clementine’s luggage tag — and then making us look again, with fresh eyes. As Edward chips away at Patricia’s resistance, the pair start to build a new story for Ripley, together. And as they do, we get to watch that same story play out on screen, with Ehrenreich ably slipping into the Ripley role, Cooke recast as his mark. It’s not just a wily way to unspool a new, meta mystery. It also offers Ehrenreich to really show off his stuff, running away with the film by way of his many ever-shifting characters.
While Murray-Smith’s script keeps a steady head on the multiplying storylines — Edward and Patricia at work, Edward and Clementine at play, Tom and “Clementine” delighting across Rome — the film does lose some steam when it veers too far off the two-hander nature that powered its first half. Watching Ehrenreich slip into Tom Ripley’s skin is a hoot, but it’s more edifying watching him face off against Mirren. The film offers no neat answers to its many characters and plotlines, but perhaps that’s the real joy of the mystery: actual mystery, and an enduring obsession with how this all fits together. Maybe it doesn’t, but it’s sure fun to watch.
Grade: B
“A Talent for Murder” premiered at the 2026 Toronto International Film Festival. Bleecker Street will release the film in theaters on Friday, October 23.
English (US) ·