Anton Corbijn's 'A Talent for Murder' Fails Patricia Highsmith's Legacy

Helen Mirren plays Patricia Highsmith in A Talent for Murder, and the film opens in theaters on October 23 after premiering at the 2026 Toronto International Film Festival. The verdict from The Film Stage's review: this is "the definition of a competent mediocrity," and Highsmith deserved better.

The film belongs to a subgenre the review dubs "Mirrenslop" — prestige-leaning vehicles for aging actresses that the writer groups with the Israeli hagiography Golda, another entry that might earn its distributor a single token Oscar nomination in the makeup category. Mirren, done up as one of America's greatest writers, anchors the story of Highsmith's final year.

What is the film about?

The year is 1995. A publishing-house employee named Edward (Alden Ehrenreich) travels to Switzerland to persuade the aging, heavy-drinking, curmudgeonly Highsmith to write one last Ripley book. She is far from convinced. Edward's knowledge of her work and his persistence eventually win her over — or rather, when he opens up about his hardscrabble childhood, his dead parents, and a pretty rich girl (Olivia Cooke) he met on the train, Highsmith realizes there is material for a perfect murder story. What if Edward wanted to integrate himself into that girl's rich family?

From there, fact and fiction begin to blend. The review notes this blending is never too disorienting or thought-provoking.

How does Anton Corbijn direct it?

The helmer is Anton Corbijn, the Joy Division and U2 photographer-turned-filmmaker. The review's judgment is blunt: he "once seemed a promising director, but as of late appears content with nice-enough-looking hackwork." The dramatizations of an unwritten Ripley novel unfold in attractive Swiss locations, recalling Corbijn's watered-down Melville riff The American — though far from that film's deliberate arthouse pacing.

The reviewer writes: "I guess one has to applaud him for giving up any pretensions."

Signposts of the territory: at least three jump scares involving Highsmith appearing out of nowhere, and a stream of one-liners engineered for easy laughs. Taking "a very silly concept and playing it relatively straight," the film is fairly predictable, if watchable.

What do the performances deliver?

Mirren's work is described as "glazed ham acting" — admittedly not boring. Ehrenreich fares better in the review's assessment. His role emphasizes how steadily his scrunched, handsome face contains both a likable leading man and a sinister killer. The reviewer recalls why Ehrenreich earned comparisons to Jack Nicholson when he arrived with Francis Ford Coppola's Tetro in 2009.

The pity, the review adds, is that the dynamic between the two leads feels shallow at the end of the day.

Why does Highsmith deserve better?

Highsmith, best known for The Talented Mr. Ripley — which the review calls "an undeniable masterpiece" — used crime fiction to explore what feels like all of human experience. Her oeuvre transcended the early equivalent of "airport" novels through searing explorations of misogyny, class, and the unknowable quality of every person.

Would she have approved of this heavily fictionalized account of her last year on earth? Likely not, the review concludes. The film stands as specialty-box-office filler for a writer whose work was anything but.

A Talent for Murder premiered at the 2026 Toronto International Film Festival and opens in theaters on October 23.