When a cleaner starts working for a wealthy woman, she gets sucked in by a luxury mansion bursting with secrets. Get the popcorn ready for a preposterous world of locked rooms, creepy gardeners … and bodies
T
he writer Matthew Barry and director Ashley Way gave us one of the highlights of 2023’s television output in Men Up, a witty, moving, compassionate treat of a drama about the development of the drug that would become known as Viagra and the group of Welshmen who were among its first guinea pigs.
Their new offering is a more straightforward one, and if it doesn’t achieve the same success Men Up did, they can hardly be condemned for having set their bar so high.
The Guest is a fast, furious, preposterous thriller of the kind that you can only pull off if everyone involved in its creation and consumption approaches it without an ounce of cynicism. Barry, Way and the high-calibre cast hold up their end of the bargain, delivering bags of propulsive plot. Viewers must hold up theirs via uncritical acceptance of the multiple twists, and bring along enough metaphorical or actual popcorn for the ride.
