Helen Mirren is the Famed author Patricia Highsmith. Patricia in real life believed her diabolical fictional character Tom Ripley was destined for a film adaptation by Alfred Hitchcock, it never came.  He praised her writing and adapted her novel “Strangers on the Train” to surmounting success. The story goes he told her the next book you write I will make into a film, she came up with the character Tom Ripley after, Hitchcock moved on never adapting her works to film again. It perplexed her until her death.

  “The poet of apprehension”  she was called by author Graham Greene. “A Talent for Murder” is about Highsmith, but more importantly her process.  The film is not a true story and not a fulfilling ending. It is a film about the characters you create that will never leave you, even after death and is based on the play “Switzerland” by Joanna Murray-Smith, who also wrote the adapted screenplay.

After that book Highsmith began her Tom Ripley series. The murdering social-climbing fraudster. An adaptation of “The Talented Mr. Ripley” would be made in 1960 under the name “Purple Moon” and a second adaptation would come in 1999 with Matt Damon being Mr. Ripley.

“A Talent of Murder” is a blend of her stories being played out as she is being  persuaded by a young man named Edward, played by Aiden Ehrenreich, to add one last installment of her Ripley series.  It’s a clever psychological thriller played out as Edward brain storming with Patricia he takes on the traits of Ripley with a woman he met on a train, get it, strangers on a train begins the film.

The delicate placements of red play on the viewers eyes much like in her works. Sometimes it is a dress, or a lampshade or maybe in the painting. There is a darkness to the film as equal to her stories-reflections matter a lot in this. A reminder we are dealing with blood, with murder even when it is a quieter moment. HIghsmoth was brash and brutal in her writing about the devious upper crust, and rich socialites. The film tries to be the same. Is Edward being manipulated by Patricia or is he manipulating Patricia to get the novel done. It’s a psychological chess match. A duel to get the writer to write again. It is rich, saturated, engaging  and strongly written. It is a writer’s story and the passion of writing and the passion of Highsmith’s works are there and proudly. There is a lull in the belly of the second act, the middle of the film that relies too much on being the story inside the story.  “Our hero likes the risk, it’s where he feels most alive.” says Edward in the film about Ripley and the film doesn’t play on the risk, it plays on the nastiness of Edward Ridgeway  and Patricia Highsmith and their brutal nastiness to each other. Writers are difficult to others and themselves. What works is Edward flipping between roles, and his transformations are caused by Patrica or was he looking for someone to be a catalyst. In the end Patricia wants Tom Ripley to be done with her but can she ever be done with him.  8./10