As Netflix continues to mass-produce original movies, it’s become easier to spot the elements and safeguards put in place to guarantee as many eyeballs as possible so the streamer can gleefully announce on Twitter that one of its films broke a new record for viewership (without providing any evidence).
Frequent consumers of these films—as opposed to the ones purchased and distributed by Netflix—know they’re relatively short, often clocking in under two hours. The plots are simple and easy to follow. They’re paced so that something eventful is happening at every moment to preserve your attention. There’s hardly any experimenting with sound or cinematography. And in case you’re folding laundry or cleaning your bedroom while watching, characters will occasionally announce what they’re doing to keep you up to speed, much like a standard telemovie or a primetime show. Most significantly, because they’re confined to a specific, profit-driven blueprint involving rigorous testing, these movies usually aren’t great.
In that way, it’s not totally surprising that The Weekend Away, Netflix’s latest original film, debuting Thursday, feels more like an errand than a piece of art. The trailer for the new thriller—which is based on the novel of the same name by Sarah Alderson, who wrote the script—teased a more complex, mystifying psychological thriller thanks to some crafty editing. And even though the film’s foreign setting and its subject matter, which somewhat resembles the real-life story of Amanda Knox, appeared overly familiar, a crime story about female friendship, sex, drugs, and scattered memories seemed like it could take some fun and exciting turns.
And then there’s the fact that The Weekend Away is a rare star vehicle for Leighton Meester, whose iconic role as Blair Waldorf on Gossip Girl in the mid to late aughts never blossomed into the A-list acting career she deserved, despite her appearing in countless mainstream projects in the years since. The new film’s logline even evoked the 2011 thriller The Roommate, in which she gives a thematically retrograde but enthralling performance as a mentally unstable college student who nurtures a frightening obsession with a female friend.
Unfortunately, while a new Netflix movie will most certainly offer Meester more visibility and generate some nostalgia, it doesn’t do her any favors as a talented performer.
It’s easy to see how The Weekend Away, directed by Kim Farrant, works as an engaging beach read, as we get concise glimpses into the characters’ personal lives and their complicated, unhealthy relationships to one another. But the slow build of the novel’s plot and central mystery doesn’t translate well in the screen adaptation, which instead feels eager to get itself over with.
Meester plays Beth, a young mother in an unsatisfying relationship with an English man named Rob (Luke Norris), who has a subtly distrustful vibe we pick up on early in the film. Beth flies from her home in London to Croatia to spend a weekend with her free-spirited, cocaine-snorting best friend Kate (Christina Wolfe), who’s recently divorced and living extravagantly off her ex’s money. When the two go out for a night of clubbing, Kate introduces Beth to a group of men and encourages her to have a one-night stand to potentially re-charge her currently chaste relationship. After agreeing to mingle with the guys, Beth wakes up the next morning with only a few startling memories of the previous night. Blood is splattered on the floor and Kate is nowhere to be found.
Beth promptly reports a missing persons case to Croatian police, who exhibit the level of indifference you would expect about a woman who does coke and takes men home from clubs. From there, we learn some new developments and surprising revelations about Kate and Beth’s relationship and a few mysterious side characters. However, the film maintains a steady, formulaic rhythm throughout that doesn’t allow for any real suspense or emotional buildup before Beth uncovers something new. Likewise, we arrive at different locations and glean new information the way you would move a piece around a board game until you get to the inevitable end.
In relation to the film’s pacing, one of The Weekend Away’s most glaring issues is that Beth’s journey in solving Kate’s disappearance doesn’t come across as particularly difficult, despite the genuinely stressful and overwhelming situation she’s in. She’s a surprisingly fast-thinking sleuth and vigilante with straightforward opportunities to snap photos, sneak into forbidden areas, and parse through evidence. Additionally, much of her mission is aided by a handsome Syrian cab driver named Zain (Ziad Bakri), whose immaculately timed appearances and selfless contributions to Kate’s case prompt perpetual eye-rolling.
Ivan Šardi/Netflix
Ivan Šardi/NetflixThe film makes no effort to counteract the stereotypes and cliches that emerge when a man of Zain’s ethnicity and immigration status acts as an unpaid chauffeur and security guard for a random white woman embroiled in serious legal drama that threatens his own livelihood. There’s a concerted focus on his generosity and kindness that ironically underscores the fact that he shouldn’t be doing Beth any favors at all. Furthermore, his characterization leans into a tired trope that justifies an immigrant’s existence based on their morality and service. Overall, the use of him in this story feels like a white woman’s weird, problematic fantasy that should’ve been left in the drafts and, ideally, never written down at all.
The most promising yet unfulfilled aspect of The Weekend Away is the perplexing friendship at its core that gets little screen time or introspection. In a brief conversation over dinner at the beginning of the film, we see that Kate and Beth’s interests and ways of moving through life are blatantly at odds. At once, Kate seems to admire and long for her friend’s boldness and disregard for traditional social rules while also finding her behavior extremely discomforting. Ultimately, the 90-minute flick doesn’t have enough time to flesh out their dynamic or dig into their history, which would certainly enhance the psychological aspect of the film and make Beth’s possible criminality more of a legitimate question mark.
In sum, The Weekend Away is a waste of Meester’s time and talent, though she’s genuinely good with the material she’s given. During my screening, I kept thinking how much better the film could have been with Meester embodying the more vivacious Kate and, obviously, with the chance to get to know her as more than a tragic party girl. While this movie will probably end up on Netflix's Top 10 list over the weekend and maybe even become a trending topic online, it owes its brilliant star a lot more.
