Terminal (2018)

Terminal arrives in 2018 as a neon-soaked neo-noir assembled from parts we recognize on sight: the pair of hitmen, the waitress with a secret, the limping janitor, the criminal mastermind watching monitors from a closet. Vaughn Stein directs with an enthusiasm for surfaces that borders on the devotional, and Margot Robbie produces and performs in a dual role requiring her to be both femme fatale and grieving daughter. The critics were unkind. Rolling Stone awarded it zero stars.

For the purposes of cultural classification, the film offers almost nothing to hold. The ensemble is largely white, with non-white performers in incidental supporting parts, a matter of casting convenience as opposed to any stated representational ambition. The twins at its center are lethal and command the frame, yet they operate as revenge archetypes inherited from noir, not as vehicles for a thesis about women. Race never enters the conversation. Neither does class, climate, or the body. This is a closed system of attractive criminals settling private scores, and the film has no interest in anything beyond the walls of its terminal.

There is no sermonizing here, which counts as its own small mercy. The picture wants to titillate and unsettle, and it does so without pausing to instruct us on how to feel about the world outside the station. The result is a stylish, derivative, occasionally audacious crime film that bombed at the box office and will be remembered, if at all, for Simon Pegg playing against type. A sommelier would call it a vintage with no terroir. We drink it anyway.