OTT Review: The Weekend Away

At the risk of sounding sexist, let me just say it out loud: The Weekend Away is probably going to go down much better with the ladies. Other than the fact that the two lead actors are both women, there is female bonding (and its subsequent travails), pretty frames and ensembles, loads of emotions and, at times, complex personal situations that hit home in more senses than one. Having said that, even if you are an agnostic watcher, don’t entirely go by the vapid reviews the movie has racked up: The Weekend Away is a crime thriller with heady drama and lop-sided twists that manages to not be gritty in the usual noir style.

Much of the action takes place over a short stretch — a weekend and a few more days. Besties Beth (Leighton Meester — who I’d last watched in The Roommate, also available on Netflix) and Kate (Christina Wolfe) decide to hook up for a weekend, on a whim (fanned more by Kate), in an unnamed city in Croatia. Beth is a new mother, trapped in a marriage that’s going south, and Kate has just had a bad breakup. The plan is that for the next 48 hours they will relive their younger — and wilder — days, when they couldn’t spend a day without each other.

By the end of the weekend, one of them will be dead, while the other has to contend with a botched-up investigation in a foreign land, with the unlikely help from a (Syrian immigrant) taxi driver called Zain (Ziad Bakri).

None of the performances are rousing, but you are kind of caught up in an intriguing plot, where everyone is a suspect in a murder mystery (because each has a motive, however far-fetched), and where everyone seems to be concealing more than revealing. The notable exception in the performance stakes is Ziad Bakri: Zain, the cabbie played by him, despite his “good intentions” is also a suspect, and he balances both “possibilities” quite beautifully. But, away from the twists and turns, and the unravelling of lies and deceit, perhaps, the best bit about The Weekend Away is the setting. The film has been predominantly shot in Split, Croatia — which is as picture-perfect as it can get. It’s great promotion for a place that always plays second fiddle to Zagreb and Dubrovnik, with everyone who’s watched the film is Googling “Where has The Weekend Away been shot?”

sushmita@khaleejtimes.com

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