The Guilty Movie Review: An unnecessary remake

The Guilty Story: A 911 call operator tries to save a woman who has been abducted.The Guilty Review: Joe Baylor (Jake Gyllenhaal) is a former street cop recently transferred to answering 911 calls. Joe is high-strung at the desk on a night when a wildfire has overwhelmed the emergency services in Los Angeles. His restless behaviour appears to be from the stress of the job, but there’s more at play. Amidst his professional issues, he gets a troubling call from Emily (voiced by Riley Keough). She is distraught and cryptic about her whereabouts. Joe manages to decipher that she has been abducted and tries to track her down. But when he can’t get her precise location, he takes it on himself to save her by utilizing all his resources. Jake Gyllenhaal takes the spotlight in this remake of the Danish film of the same name. Staged entirely within the confines of the emergency call centre, the camera stays focused on the actor for the majority of the film. As the plot unravels mainly through calls, Gyllenhaal is tasked with keeping us riveted and invested enough to sit through the claustrophobic setting. Fortunately, his compelling intensity is well-suited for the role of a demoted officer battling his own demons. While Gyllenhaal flexes his acting skills as Joe, the rest of the cast, relegated mainly to conversing with him on the phone, doesn’t quite match up. Even when Joe does interact with a few of his colleagues in person, his temperamental behaviour is often side-stepped, and the plot armour around him thickens. Director Antoine Fuqua has proved his mettle with engrossing and intense fare in the past, but he allows too many narrative loopholes in ‘The Guilty’. Although the film’s first half hooks you into the mayhem of an emergency response centre, the second half increasingly wavers, especially when it circles back to Joe’s personal problems. The treatment restricts us to Joe’s perspective, and while Gyllenhaal is undoubtedly talented, the emotional investment is too demanding without a rewarding payoff. As a result, it often comes across as melodramatic, which puts a strain on the runtime, and that really shouldn’t be the case with an hour and a half film. Eventually, ‘The Guilty’ proves that some remakes are uncalled for.