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Lack of suspense, boring characters derail 'Girl on the Train'

By the time all the confusing, chronologically shifted fragments finally come together in Tate Taylor's muddled murder mystery "The Girl on the Train," our own train of thoughtful concern has long since left the station.

Not a single character in this dreary and dour dramatic experience earns our empathy, sympathy or good will. At a Tuesday night screening, the audience periodically broke into laughter at dialogue and actions clearly not intended to be funny.

And yet, the plot only works if we believe two key characters to be among the stupidest women in New York City when it comes to putting themselves in situations reeking with potential jeopardy.

"The Girl on the Train," from the best-selling novel by Paula Hawkins, requires three droning voice-over narrators to set up the premise of how and why one of them winds up dead in the woods.

The principal narrator turns out to be Rachel Watson (Emily Blunt), a raging alcoholic who regales us with details of her obsessive curiosity about a mystery woman she watches every day from a Metro North commuter train.

Another narrator, Anna (Rebecca Ferguson), adds to the puzzle by telling us about her marriage to Tom Watson (Justin Theroux), Rachel's ex, and having the baby that Rachel couldn't give Tom.

The third narrator, Megan (Haley Bennett), works as a nanny for Anna's baby, and lives with a hunky dude named Scott (Luke Evans), who desperately wants a baby, but can't persuade Megan to make that happen.

Early on, we discover Megan to be the mystery woman whom Rachel watches from afar. And watches and watches.

Until the morning she sees Megan apparently kissing a man who's clearly not Scott.

"Who is this man?" Rachel asks us in a voice-over, suggesting that director Taylor did not trust his actress' face to communicate the confusion created by the stranger's appearance.

In the visual medium of movies, a voice-over can be the easiest, laziest way to tell a story or define a character. The second-easiest would be to employ a shrink for a character to confide feelings and secrets to, thereby enabling a screenwriter to spoon-feed plot and character information.

The psychologically damaged Megan frequently seeks solace from sexy psychiatrist Dr. Kamal Abdic (Edgar Ramirez), who possesses a few ethics problems of his own and who only pops into the story when screenwriter Erin Cressida Wilson needs plot points explained.

These humorless, one-dimensional characters turn "The Girl on the Train" into a colossal dontcarewhodunit, a suspense-challenged mystery that hinges on Rachel's conveniently timed miraculous memory recovery following her blackout on the night of the murder.

After delivering an Oscar-caliber performance as an FBI agent in last year's "Sicario," Blunt looks effectively drawn and dowdy as a doozy of a boozy floozy.

Bennett, whose smoldering, sulking sexuality pumped Antoine Fuqua's "Magnificent Seven" with dramatic ammo, comes off drab and sparkless as the story's resident hottie. Even supporting characters played by Allison Janney (as a cop) and "Friends" alum Lisa Kudrow (as a business executive) feel like perfunctory additions.

Credit "The Girl on the Train" for making tracks with Danny Elfman's surprisingly (for him) untraditional music, a moody, anti-melodic score radiating with atonal tension and pulsating suspense lacking in every other compartment on this unexciting ride.

“The Girl on the Train”

★ ½

Starring: Emily Blunt, Justin Theroux, Haley Bennett, Rebecca Ferguson, Luke Evans, Edgar Ramirez, Allison Janney

Directed by: Tate Taylor

Other: A Universal Pictures release. Rated R for language, nudity, sexual situations, violence. 112 minutes

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