Review: ‘White Lie’
White Lie is a sleek, well-directed and highly engrossing micro-thriller reminiscent of Steven Soderbergh’s more recent films that is anchored by a mesmerizing performance from Kacey Rohl.
There is something very wrong with Katie. It is apparent from the moment we first see her, her deeply calculating and anxious eyes betraying her picturesque smile and her perfectly poised demeanor as she attempts to promote a fundraiser to help cover her non-existent cancer treatment, leading people into a twisted maze of her own making.
Impeccably played by Kacey Rohl, Katie is, as we soon come to find out, a grifter, conning people – including her devoted girlfriend Jennifer (Amber Anderson) – into believing she is suffering from cancer for the money and attention she so desperately craves. After a tense encounter with her estranged father (Martin Donovan), who looks down on her deceitful lifestyle, Katie finds that her secret, which she has tried so desperately to keep, is on the verge of being uncovered and she soon goes to desperate and dangerous lengths in order to protect it, recruiting the corrupt Dr. Jabari Jordan (Thomas Olajide) to help cover her poorly disguised tracks.
White Lie, the fourth feature film from Canadian based duo Yonah Lewis and Calvin Thomas, is a sleek, well-directed and highly engrossing micro-thriller not unlike some of Steven Soderbergh’s more recent fare, including Unsane and the highly underrated Side Effects, all of which were small in terms of scale but were elevated by surprisingly high stakes. In another filmmaker’s hands, White Lie could have been a more conventional and low-key character study that valued emotion over entertainment value. But in Lewis and Thomas’ skilled and adept hands, it is that and so much more. The directors, who also wrote the film, manage to perfectly strike the balance between pulpy and restrained, eschewing stereotypical biopic conventions and drawing on more creative and inventive filmmaking techniques to create a tense, suspenseful, devastating and surprisingly nuanced portrait of deceit and mental illness.
Rohl, previously seen in shows such as Wayward Pines and Bryan Fuller’s future cult classic Hannibal series, is absolutely mesmerizing as the complex and charismatic Katie, imbuing her portrayal of the character – who can very easily come off as completely unlikeable on paper – with enough sincerity and sensitivity that audiences may easily find themselves sympathizing with her despite her actions and behavior, and completely understanding of why so many were swayed by her sloppy and poorly-executed ruse. This performance very much has the potential to be a star-making turn for the actress, one that may catapult her into stardom.
Elsewhere, Anderson cuts an incredibly sympathetic figure as Katie’s incredibly supportive girlfriend Jennifer. With her trusting nature and endlessly optimistic demeanor, she is the heart and soul of the film, bringing some much needed warmth to the film’s otherwise cold proceedings. Donovan does a fine job at establishing the detached nature of Katie’s father, Doug, but his role is otherwise severely underwritten, with the film foregoing much of Katie’s backstory and focusing strictly on her current predicament instead.
If the film has any faults, it may very well be its ambiguous nature when it comes to its main character. Katie is an enigma to viewers straight from the beginning and firmly remains so throughout the course of the film, with Lewis and Thomas refusing to handhold the audience and encouraging them to draw their own conclusions instead. An open-ended conclusion, in which Katie laments on what she may be able to do to uphold what remains of her charade, is the only aspect holding the film back from true greatness. Ambiguous endings can work when executed correctly but a film such as White Lie, which goes to great lengths in order to leave viewers on the edge of their seats waiting for a conclusion, would have greatly benefited from a more concrete and satisfying ending instead.
Rating: 4/5
White Lie is now available on VOD.