Skip to main content
Alice is 20 minutes into being the most interesting guest at a dinner party—she's been to Tasmania and has just discovered a new species of frog—when Tom walks in and recognizes her as Jenny, whom he hasn't seen in 15 years. A dance ensues between Rachel Weisz's Alice and Michael Shannon's Tom at the center of Complete Unknown, the new film from Joshua Marston (Maria Full of Grace).
In the nine lives that Alice has lived since last seeing Tom, she's been a hippie, a magician's assistant, a nurse and, now, a biologist. She never keeps her name or profession more than a couple years. And right when you think there's a violent seduction afoot, Complete Unknown changes its identity too, slowing into a meditation on the power of never committing to one path.
Before the film's opening in Portland, we talked to Marston about Pacific Northwest wanderlust, Shannon's comedic chops and veering away from the thriller version of Complete Unknown.
WW: In the film, Portland is where Alice first feels at home in her extreme lifestyle choice. Why here?
Joshua Marston: Portland seems like a place someone might go to liberate themselves from an overly urban lifestyle. That's part of the allure. We would constantly use the word "Portland" to stand in for a whole phase of her life.
While watching, I felt this could have been a straight thriller. Did you consider making it one?
Absolutely. The question in a thriller becomes whether [the protagonist] can get away with whatever they're trying to do. Changing identity ends up being a means to some other purpose, like robbing someone or infiltrating some network. We were much more interested in ruminating about identity—the balance between staying in one life long enough to be good at something versus opting out of boredom and risking being a dilettante. It seemed much more interesting than whether someone's going to get away with a heist.
How did you craft a lead who could be psychologically mysterious but never really unhinged?
We were very aware of avoiding presenting her as crazy. It's an extreme premise. I think one of the most important things was getting the audience to take it seriously and ask the question, "Is it actually possible to live this lifestyle?" If she's just crazy, it doesn't provoke someone to wonder. You go back home and think, "Well, I'm going back to my job that I hate in the morning, and obviously it would be great to make a change in my life but…she was crazy."
Weisz and Shannon are playing against type. Weisz, who's often very steady, is a little volatile, and Shannon, who's often mysterious, is ostensibly ordinary and even charming. How did you decide this would be a good casting fit?
I had just seen Rachel onstage in Betrayal, opposite her husband, Daniel Craig, and I was reminded of how alluring she is and the sense of mystery she's able to evoke. Both [Weisz and Shannon] have a natural quality that when you put them onscreen, the audience leans forward; you want to know what's going on in their heads. That's a rare quality. For Michael Shannon, I knew there were aspects of Tom that were funny. I'd seen him do a play called Mistakes Were Made where he was the only character onstage, and I'd never laughed so hard in a theater.
Critic's Grade: B
See IT: Complete Unknown is rated R. It opens Friday at Living Room Theaters.
Willamette Week