A theatrical thriller with a sting in its tail

Thriller by Guillem Morales The Wasp is about two women, Heather (Naomie Harris) and Carla (Natalie Dormer), who haven’t spoken to each other since high school. They both still live in the same English town and their homes are probably only a short bus ride away from each other. But they live in different worlds, mainly because only one of them would ever take the bus.

Heather (Naomie Harris) leads a pleasant suburban life, with a posh accent, a nice home and a chic wardrobe. Her husband Simon (Dominic Allburn) is successful, although the audience never finds out exactly what he does, only that he has a job that involves socializing with other smartly dressed people and drinking bottles of presumably expensive wine.

Carla (Natalie Dormer) is huddled in a cramped apartment with her four children next to her husband Jim (Rupert Holliday-Evans), who seems to divide his time between napping in his armchair and gambling away the rent money. We know he’s not the father of all of Carla’s children, but we assume he’s responsible for the baby in her oven. They’re barely making ends meet on the money she earns as a cashier at a supermarket – supplemented by occasional sex work – so the prospect of another eater to feed isn’t something that fills Carla with joy.

After a slow start that tries to draw us into Heather’s mind as she tortures wasps and stares at her husband, The Wasp succeeds quickly and succinctly in locating the two women in their very different lives. And as soon as they come together, the film comes to life.

Heather contacts Carla to discuss a business proposal. The two meet for coffee and then walk around town together. The camera moves quickly to accompany Carla’s quick steps and Heather’s growing anxiety as she tries to keep up. It’s an energetic piece of cinematography that stands in stark contrast to the rest of the story, which is confined to a single setting.

Heather wants Carla to kill her husband. Simon has wronged her and she seeks revenge. Her memories of Carla’s reckless behavior during her teenage years convince her that she is the right woman for the job. Moreover, she knows that Carla cannot afford to turn down the money she is offering. From then on, the rest of the film is basically one long conversation between the women, who meet at Heather’s house to discuss the details of the possible murder. As they talk, events from their school days resurface, driving their conversation and the film’s plot into a series of unexpected twists.

You can tell The Wasp was originally written for the stage, with Morgan Lloyd Malcolm adapting her own 2015 play. As more traumatic revelations are made and the tension mounts, accusations and mutual recriminations fly in all directions, Harris and Dormer spin emotionally charged monologues. And while both performances are not without their fair share of theatrical affectations – exaggerated gestures that probably go down well on stage but look a little odd when the character walks the floorboards of a fully realized living room – they are both generally excellent.

Both Heather and Carla become more differentiated as characters than The Wasp progresses. Heather’s initial fragility gives way to a rage that seemed unimaginable just moments ago. And the dead-eyed bravery that seems to define Carla turns out to be a defensive stance, something she adopted too early in life and that has now hardened into a permanent way of life.

As the title promises, The Wasp is a film with a sting in its tail. But some of the revelations it unleashes in the third act feel a little heavy-handed, as if it doesn’t trust us to fully empathize with its characters unless it subjects their younger selves to the most nightmarish forms of abuse. As the conflict between Carla and Heather grows more serious, Morales’ film also paints itself into a corner. And as it struggles to find an elegant way to extricate itself from that corner, we’re led to a finale that’s as unsurprising as it is unsatisfying.