Rachel Weisz, an actress capable of assuming many guises, plays Alice, a woman who studies up on various fields, and then fakes her way in. Initially, director Joshua Marston gives no indication of Alice's motivations, but she seems more mysterious than malevolent. Although Alice appears to meet environmental agency worker Clyde (Michael Chernus) by chance, it's actually a pre-planned encounter. She tells him she's a biologist, they hit it off, and he introduces her to his co-worker, Tom (Michael Shannon), who's married to Ramina (Azita Ghanizada), a jewelry maker planning to move from New York to California for work. When Tom meets Alice, he is both suspicious and intrigued. At his birthday party, she freely admits that Alice isn't her given name, that she's lived all over the world, and that she no longer has anything to do with her family. In private, Tom acknowledges that he remembers her from when she went by a different name, but after she disappeared, he assumed she had died. As the night wears on, Tom's friends, including Clyde, start to think Alice is a pathological liar. Alice explains herself to Tom, but then they run into Nina (Kathy Bates), a dog-walking secretary, who takes the narrative in a different direction as Alice and Tom help her out of a jam (Danny Glover plays Nina's husband). Complete Unknown is not a completely satisfying movie, but the leads make the most of out of their roles. A strong optional purchase. (K. Fennessy)
Complete Unknown
Sony, 92 min., R, DVD: $25.99 Volume 32, Issue 1
Complete Unknown
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