The best psychological thrillers are bound to mess with your head, but that is not always because they’re very complicated. It is also possible that the concept will make you realize harsh truths about yourself and your reality. A good psychological thriller is based on a common fear of the viewers that keeps them guessing and invested throughout the runtime.
There are many great psychological thriller movies nobody remembers because they get overshadowed by other bigger films that were released at the same time or because the same few famous psychological thrillers are mentioned whenever discussing the genre. About 21 years ago, Ryan Gosling starred in a psychological thriller, whose lack of popularity could be because of both these reasons.
Stay Is A Dark Psychological Thriller
Ryan Gosling stars in Marc Forster’s Stay as Henry Letham, a suicidal art student whose regular psychiatrist has gone on sabbatical. He is instead currently being treated by Dr. Sam Foster, played by Ewan McGregor, who is deeply concerned with Henry’s well-being. Henry confuses him on their first meeting by successfully predicting hail despite the weather report not mentioning it.
After learning of Henry’s intentions to take his own life, Sam becomes invested in protecting him, but keeps losing his grasp on reality as confusing events make him question his own sanity. Henry seems to have a weird grasp on the occurrences around him. His shock at Sam’s colleague’s blindness proves influential because he gains sight by the movie’s ending.
However, Stay isn’t a whimsical film. It is rooted in sorrow, as Henry seems adamant about taking his own life on a specific date at midnight. His obsession with an artist known for suicide and calling that his most bold piece of art makes him particularly volatile. Sam consistently tries to stop him while grappling with his own confusion.
You May Need To See Stay More Than Once
Stay is not a straightforward film at all, and quite like the most notorious psychological thrillers, it is a movie you need to watch twice or even more to fully comprehend. There are new details to discover every time you watch it, because the foreshadowing in Stay is layered. It’s confusing because most of the film unfolds through Sam’s eyes.
The climax of the movie reveals a plot twist that changes the entire film, and while it almost automatically explains every complicated detail, the plot itself becomes more interesting on a rewatch, because you finally understand not just why Sam’s reality gradually becomes warped, but why the bizarre events occur in the order they do, leading up to the climax.
Stay’s Editing Makes It Even More Confusing
Sam’s struggle to cope with the disturbing occurrences around him is also conveyed visually, as the physical frame of vision is constantly warped during the transitions. The movie’s transitions are its strongest suit, as they make you question what you’re watching in a scene. Characters and rooms morph into each other so seamlessly that you can’t trust your own eyes.
With camera angles that slowly become less stable and editing that becomes gradually more fluid with time, the movie also visually creates the experience of losing one’s grasp on reality over a span of time. It puts you as the viewer in Sam’s shoes, even when it follows Henry, getting you invested in Henry’s fate as much as Sam is.
The Movie Has An Incredible Ensemble Cast
Naomi Watts as Lila Culpepper, Sam’s ex-patient and current girlfriend, rounds out the main cast of Stay. It is harder to understand why the movie is known so little, considering how famous its cast is. Ryan Gosling had just given his breakthrough performance in The Notebook a year prior, and McGregor had played everyone’s favorite Jedi just two years before.
Stay is among Ryan Gosling’s movies with a bad Rotten Tomatoes score because critics were unimpressed by its execution and found the plot to be incoherent. It is perhaps understandable that the movie has become obscure as a result, but the audience score proves that viewers enjoy Stay. I would say the moody performances are reason enough to watch it.
Stay’s Angsty Characters Are Quintessentially 2000s
Anyone who grew up in the 2000s knows that angst was a personality trait of thrillers and crime movies during that time. Every film with a dark subject took itself too seriously at times, often leading to unintentional comedy. But most frequently, it led to edgy explorations of mental health that seem ill-conceived in hindsight.
The gloomy visuals, the tense performances that are somehow simultaneously somewhere between caricature and unserious, and the overtly dark dialogue contribute to Stay‘s depressing atmosphere. It is one of Ryan Gosling’s best movies, but it could also test your patience if you don’t like how angsty movie characters from the 2000s can be.