I watched Guillermo Del Toro’s Nightmare Alley yesterday and… It was ok.

I might have been let down a little because I love both Guillermo Del Toro and the source material (by the way, you can find both the original black&white movie and the book for free, legally, on the internet archive) so I had a lot of expectations.

The actors are solid, the movie has a very nice forties ambiance (I love the psychologist’s office design) and some scenes are wonderful (the one scene dealing with the consequence of his actions… and the final scene which was already one of the strong points from the original story) but I felt that the scenario was lacking. In particular, it gets very very linear and unsurprising once they get out of the carnival (also, I believe all the parts on the main character’s father could have been omitted, I suspect it hinders more than it adds to the story).

Overall, it is nice but a little disappointing. Probably still worth watching if you loved the original or the director.