dir. Paul McGuigan
This should be a fairly simple, straightforward romance about a man becoming reacquainted with his lost love, but Wicker Park turns its central premise into a dizzying rollercoaster ride of insane plot twists, confusing character motivations and terrible direction. A non-linear timeline structure reveals Matt (Josh Harnett) and Lisa (Diane Kruger) broke up some years prior, for reasons so stupid and nonsensical that even the movie seems unable to acknowledge them for long. There’s also the reveal that a jealous neighbour, Alex (Rose Byrne), harbours an obsession with Matt, which manifests in ways both nefarious and benevolent. Alex is an especially egregious example of a character whose desires, beliefs, and fundamental personality seem to alter from minute to minute, meaning none of her choices make a shred of sense. The whole movie is buoyed along by choppy camera work, strange zoom-ins and freezes, and obnoxiously lurid colour saturation. It’s obvious Wicker Park thinks it’s telling a much grander, more sweeping story than it really is.
BMDb 