‘Reptile’ review: A staredown, dark thriller-style, between Benicio Del Toro and Justin Timberlake

Sometimes a great performance is enough to pull you through a half-baked script. In the dark thriller “Reptile” on Netflix, a police detective played by Benicio Del Toro works to solve the brutal murder of a real estate agent, and del Toro single-handedly keeps the film afloat. There’s some irony to that, because he also shares screenwriting credit with director Grant Singer and Benjamin Brewer. Del Toro’s instincts are unbeatable as an actor — he has the kind of face that can suggest a hundred emotions rippling beneath the surface: watchfulness, wariness, anger, disappointment, jaded resignation, obvious love for his wife — but on the writing side, it’s a bit shakier.

We know little about the victim, who was stabbed to death while alone in a house she was showing. Detective Tom Nichols (Del Toro) and his boss (Eric Bogosian) — who is also his wife’s uncle, it’s all very chummy — arrive at the crime scene. “Get those people across the street,” says Bogosian’s seen-it-all police captain, “and no press, I don’t want anyone talking to them.” He turns to an officer: “Whadda we got?” We got a dead realtor, comes the answer. This isn’t scintillating dialogue.

The woman was young and pretty, with a tattoo running the length of her spine that looks like a bike tread. That detail is introduced and then abandoned, like so many others throughout the film, including the molted snakeskin she finds in the house hours before her death, or the cut on Tom’s hand that’s treated with great portent but turns out to be … just an unexplained cut.

The suspects are as follows: The victim’s live-in boyfriend, also a real estate agent, played by Justin Timberlake as a slick but blandly handsome type with mommy issues. There’s also the victim’s ex-husband, who is apparently still in the picture. We learn next to nothing about him either, aside from the fact that he makes ill-judged art projects that incorporate hair illicitly trimmed from the heads of unsuspecting women. Or maybe the killer is that legitimately disgruntled weirdo whose family got ripped off in a land deal, played by Michael Pitt going full-tilt creep.

Tom and his colleagues in the police department diligently work the case and the easygoing family atmosphere they share is cozy as can be — until it isn’t. Tom is unsure who to trust, except for his loyal wife Judy (Alicia Silverstone). She helps him sort through clues about the case, but later even she gets the side eye from Tom when he thinks she’s getting a little too friendly with the contractor redoing their kitchen. (Tom spots a contactless faucet in one of the suspect’s homes and is inspired to get one for his own home remodel; it’s one of few sardonic details that really lands).

Director Singer evokes the right kind of grimy, noir mood — sinister and full of tension, with overcast skies — but the movie only packs a punch when the camera is focused on Del Toro’s wonderful visage. There are some interesting and unexplored class issues at play; the wealth of Timberlake’s character contrasted with the more working class personalities of the cops investigating him. And how does Tom’s boss/uncle-in-law afford such a nice house on the water? Del Toro and Silverstone make a meal out of what tends to be a pro forma side to these kinds of thrillers: The stalwart wife at home. Other moments feel ginned up. As Tom is looking through the victim’s home, he opens a medicine cabinet and suddenly Timberlake appears in the mirror’s reflection. It’s played as a jump scare, but why? We already knew he was there.

The moment doesn’t make sense, but Del Toro’s looming presence compensates time and again, full of moral quandaries, heavy sighs and a desire to just do the job at hand.

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'REPTILE'

2 stars (out of 4)

MPA rating: R (for language, violence and some nude images)

Running time: 2:14

How to watch: On Netflix Friday

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