The Woman in Cabin 10

The whodunnit murder-mystery genre has exploded as of late. There are so many new projects arriving in this segment that it can be hard to keep track, and equally challenging to determine which are worth a damn. Recently, Netflix premiered a new project in this area, a film known as The Woman in Cabin 10, and you may have seen its star-studded line-up and wondered if its worthy of a watch. Frankly, that's up for debate.

The premise of this film is that an investigative journalist has been invited to attend a luxury yacht voyage that marks a sending off, if you will, of a rich philanthropist. The voyage sees various socialites and celebrities on board, each of whom are present to witness the final days of the absurdly wealthy Anne Bullmer, which might sound like a pleasant way to spend a few days on the open ocean, but in reality turns into a nightmare. On the first night, the woman residing in cabin 10 is murdered, thrown overboard into the harsh North Sea, and this causes Kiera Knightley's journalist Lo to press to unravel the truth. But here's where the catch is introduced. At every turn she makes, evidence disappears and it stops looking like a murder and more like the ravings of a mad woman. And yet she is being threatened to stop pursuing answers, so where does the truth really lie...?

The premise is actually sound and has interesting depth to it. There's a compelling mystery at the heart of this film that makes you begin to question Lo and what she saw. The gaslighting and the way the narrative is built around this is effective, but this is the problem at the same time, as beyond this The Woman in Cabin 10 doesn't really have any tricks up its sleeve.

The plot revolves around this slate of rich yacht passengers who you are introduced to but then who have next to no influence on the story down the line. It really doesn't matter that Hannah Waddingham, Daniel Ings, Kaya Scodelario, Paul Kaye, Christopher Rygh, and David Morrissey are on board and playing characters because they have no purpose at all. And this in particular stings as these are interesting characters with depth worth exploring and which seemingly was never even a thought in the creation process.

Instead the story focuses on Lo and how she navigates a plot that orbits Guy Pearce's well-spoken but mysterious husband to Anne, Richard. He has secrets and she wants to uncover them, and this leads to exploring every nook and cranny on the yacht, speaking with passengers and crew alike all to figure out who the woman in cabin 10 was and why no one knows anything about her existence. Sure, Knightley and Pearce are fine in their respective roles, but they don't run away with their performances, stealing the spotlight at every instance. Rather they are just serviceable as leads, which becomes more of a problem when the film really lacks compelling supporting characters to shift the focus onto.

You might still think that despite these vices the tight 90-minute runtime at least means that The Woman in Cabin 10 doesn't waste your time, but there are moments in this plot that move far too slowly, unpacking a story that never rushes to any meaningful developments. It crawls along until the explosive finale that almost catches you off guard with how quick everything wraps up. It gets to the point that when the credits do roll, it feels a bit surprising that it's over, all due to the pacing being unbalanced and inconsistent.

But again it's the character development that's the real offender here, as writer/director Simon Stone clearly decided to throw this element into the North Sea alongside its mysterious woman. And this is a key thing to note because murder mystery and whodunnit stories thrive on the viewer being as stumped as the lead, always wondering which suspect is the killer. But here, even after 30 minutes, you're fairly convinced it can only be one person as no effort whatsoever is given to the rest of the cast. Naturally, once you have that information in hand, the questions are just how and why did the murder happen, and sure there is more interesting narrative to explore here, but it could have and should have been so much better.

So long story short, for 90 minutes The Woman in Cabin 10 doesn't really ask much from the viewer, but it's also a rather poorly constructed story that doesn't have the grace and skill to navigate its premise. It's another Netflix film that frankly could have been thrown out without any concern, as it fails to leave much of an impression on the viewer even despite having a strong cast and a clearly competent budget.