Directed by
David Schwimmer
97 minutes
Rated M
Reviewed by
Bernard Hemingway
Trust
Synopsis: Annie Cameron (Liana Liberato) is a 14 year old living in Chicago. Her dad (Clive Owen) and mum (Catherine Keener) are both successful professionals and Annie has everything that upper-middle class society provides, including her own lap-top. This she uses to chat with Charlie, a boy she has met online. As time progresses Charlie reveals to her that he is not a high school student, just like her, but actually a twenty-year-old college student. Then, he’s really a twenty-five-year-old grad student. Then, when they finally meeting in the local mall, he’s a man in his mid to late thirties. Despite her surprise, however, Annie seems captivated by where all this is leading.Trust is the sort of “issue-based” drama that could easily have been turned into soap-box moralizing so it is a pleasant surprise to find that in the hands of former Friends star, David Schwimmer, who has had a fairly prosaic directorial career to date (largely TV work and 2007’s Run Fatboy Run), it turns out to be a nuanced treatment of a timely subject.
No doubt much of the film’s strength lies in the fine script by Andy Bellin and Robert Festinger (who was co-writer of 2001’s In The Bedroom) which bespeaks both solid research and a skilfully balanced articulation of the material that in Schwimmer’s hands both works as a suspenseful drama and an insight into a present-day societal problem.
A populist version of this film would have turned into a breast-beating tale of innocence betrayed and righteous justice done but what makes Schwimmer’s film so effective is that Annie remains at its centre rather than using her as the catalyst for adult concerns. Certainly we get a measure of this and Clive Owen’s vengeance-obsessed Dad is the main character in this respect but the film’s great strength is the way it carefully reveals Annie’s emotional journey as she progresses from believing in the innocence of her attacker to realizing the extent of his perfidy. This aspect of the film candidly faces the complexity of the problem of young teens exploring their sexuality, an aspect also given a broader perspective by making Owen’s Will an advertising executive whose living comes from the sexualization of girls his daughter’s age. This may be regarded as too obvious a contrivance by some who will wonder how Will could really be such a decent guy and be so oblivious to the implications of his work, but perhaps this is not so implausible after all - often the wisdom of hindsight is needed to reveal such things. Christine Keener and Viola Davis as Annie's Mum and state-appointed counsellor both provide nicely counter-pointed responses to Will's self-focussed anger.
One of the key components of a bungled film of this sort is a too-easy resolution and once again Trust pleasantly surprises, ending with both a credible catharsis for both Annie and her Dad and an unnerving final statement on Annie’s attacker that avoids any glib righting of wrongs. The film tanked in America after getting a very limited theatrical release and has gone straight to DVD in Australia. Schwimmer deserved much better for such a substantial effort.
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