MOVIE REVIEW – Faithfully Yours is the latest Netflix thriller to come out of the Netherlands. This 95-minute film explores a crime mystery in which crime fans may be able to anticipate much of the plot, but overall the story is passable, even if not overly high quality or believable.

Yet Faithfully Yours contains all the ingredients that viewers usually like in a crime mystery. There are many twists and turns, each character hides a secret and creates an exciting atmosphere. This Dutch film has all the classic elements of a crime plot, and perhaps even goes over the top with them.

But this film never aspires to be more than that: an entertaining mystery where everyone is suspicious and everyone is lying. It manages to keep the viewer engaged for 95 minutes. Nevertheless, fans of the crime-thriller-detective genre will probably be able to anticipate most of the story’s plot.

Everyone here lies all the time

Best friends Bodil (Bracha van Doesburgh) and Isabel (Elise Schaap) are the kind of people who are supposed to spend a weekend together. However, that’s just what they tell their entourage to give them a solid alibi. What these successful, seemingly happily married women actually do, however, is another story entirely.

With carefully planned cultural events – shared through social media and messaging – they actually enjoy their secret relationships separately. But thanks to credible plans and concrete details, they never contradict each other afterwards.

However, when Isabel disappears, leaving a trail of blood in her wake, Bodil is caught in a web of his own lies.

If there’s one thing you learn from watching “Faithfully Yours”, it’s that everyone lies. Some people lie about big things, and others confine themselves to small, white lies. Everyone is seemingly unhappy in their current lives and chooses escape and deception to cope.

If people were honest with themselves, their lives would be better. I know that’s an oversimplification, but it’s at the heart of the story of “Faithfully Yours”.

They forget about dogs, don’t they?

The biggest problem with Faithfully Yours is that, although the Dutch filmmakers have tried to concoct an “amazingly twisty” plot, it is not too much effort to anticipate the major plot twists – especially for those who are familiar with the genre. For me, it’s a side effect of watching (and reading) a lot of crime fiction, and also an indication that there’s nothing new under the sun in this film. I like solid – but believable – twists that are not foreseen, but that is sadly not the case here.

The other is that there are elements that bother me because they are never answered. Such as the fact that there were paw prints in the blood after the missing victim, and that a dog walker was an obvious witness (who we see twice in the audience), yet he and his dog are ignored for the rest of the story. This may be a small detail, but one that was an important alibi, yet everyone forgets it, and in the unfolding of a 95-minute crime mystery, it’s a rare clumsy solution.

In the web of infidelity

The central theme is infidelity and its consequences. Bodil and Isabel feel that their marriage is boring and unsatisfying, so they have secret affairs with other men. To do this, they use each other as alibis: while one of them goes away for a conference or a wellness weekend, the other leaves the children or the housework to her. In this way, they both enjoy adventure and passion with strange men without being exposed.

However, the film does not romanticize infidelity, but shows its dangers and consequences. Bodil and Isabel are not only deceiving their husbands, but also themselves. They do not realise that their secret affairs do not solve their marital problems, but only complicate them.

The real central theme of the film is that we don’t know what happened to Isabel. (We won’t spoil it either.) The police start investigating the case, and Bodil tries to find out the truth. But in the process, he must also discover how much he has lied to himself and others. And at the end of the film, a rather implausible, yet completely predictable twist is used to “shock” the viewer.

At least the actors did their job

The strength of the film is the acting of the actors. Bracha van Doesburgh and Elise Schaap are excellent as the two friends who are both attractive and vulnerable. As Bodil, Van Doesburgh convincingly portrays the emotional struggles of a woman who loves her husband and children, but longs for something different. As Isabel Schaap, she portrays a cheerful and feisty woman, but with a lot of pain behind her.

Among the supporting cast, Nasrdin Dchar, who plays Bodil’s husband, stands out. He is a loving and caring family man, but with dreams and desires of his own. Dchar authentically portrays the feelings of a man who does not understand his wife’s behavior.

Faithfully Yours is based on a good idea, but it was not well executed. The Dutch crime thriller tries in vain to combine drama and thriller, but fails to find a balance between them. The acting of the actors is commendable, but it does not save this hour and a half film from being both implausible and predictable. And that final twist is really completely pointless nonsense…

-BadSector-