Nightmare Alley (2021)

My Review

Bradley Cooper plays an ambitious carnival worker who bounces from one problem to another in the interesting psychological thriller “Nightmare Alley.” Director Guillermo del Toro (“The Shape of Water” 2017) made an exciting motion picture with a fast-moving 150 minute running time. He also co-wrote the taut screenplay with Kim Morgan, adapted from the 1946 novel “Nightmare Alley” by William Lindsay Gresham. There was a 1947 version that starred Tyrone Power and Joan Blondell.

The very talented cast with Cooper includes Cate Blanchett, Toni Collette, William Dafoe, Richard Jenkins, Rooney Mara, Ron Pearlman, Mary Steenburgen, David Strathairn, Jim Beaver, Peter MacNeill, Tim Blake Nelson, and Romina Power (daughter of Tyrone Power).

It was nominated for four Oscars, including Best Picture, Cinematography (Dan Laustsen), Costume Design, and Production Design. “Nightmare Alley” was a box office bomb for producers Guillermo Del Toro and Bradley Cooper, Searchlight Pictures, and its parent company, Walt Disney Pictures and The Walt Disney Company. It was filmed in Buffalo, New York, and Toronto, Ontario.