Real Stories. Real Action.

Felicia Ray Owens at the Center of It All.

A sun-soaked fever dream of red flags and righteous revenge, Blink Twice dares you to look twice—and believe women the first time.

Blink Twice didn’t play at my local cinema for more than a few weeks after it premiered last summer. Blink once and you may have missed it. Now that it’s streaming on Amazon Prime and MGM+, I think it’s worth a second look.

If you’re streaming on the aforementioned platforms, I beg of you to skip past the opening title card. The trigger warning is a superfluous spoiler-laced thesis statement that could have simply read … “Warning: Sexual Violence.”

The first frame intended by Hollywood catwoman turned director Zoë Kravitz depicts a leathery, key lime lizard sitting on a rock, mean-mugging the camera while an ominous bass track blares. No context. No obvious semiotics. Just the first of many clues that you are watching a dark mystery unfold in a bright, pretty place.

Cut to our heroine on a toilet, scrolling through her phone. Frida is played by Naomie Ackie—whose manic pixie cut and lack of poise make us instantly forget that she just played the hell out of Whitney Houston in Kasi Lemmons’ I Wanna Dance With Somebody. Frida isn’t going to win a Grammy anytime soon. Frida is pantless, vulnerable.

On her socials, she watches tech oligarch Slater King (Channing Tatum) apologize for something naughty. He says he’s really sorry. The sacred squat-n-surf ritual is interrupted by Jess (Alia Shawkat). Frida returns her yellow happy face lighter, and Jess hands her friend a roll of toilet paper. Friendship.

That night, Frida and Jess are ordered to smile but remain invisible in their roles as banquet servers. During prep for the service, we enter midway into an argument with Frida claiming she isn’t mad at her bestie (which means she is). “I can’t just magically erase shit from my brain,” laments Frida. It turns out Jess is “giving away her power” by getting back together with a toxic ex. “I just don’t understand why you keep going back,” says Frida.

Conversations like this one felt a bit like throwaways in the theater, but upon my rewatch I found the irony rich. The fact that women often return to the arms of their abusers is one of the film’s most complex themes. We allow amnesia to set in, yet something deep within us never forgets.

By the end of the evening, Frida trips and falls right into Slater King’s arms, scoring them both an invitation to Slater’s private island.

Joining the free vacation is a host of gorgeous girls and men with adequate personalities and amazing bank accounts.

On team supermodel, there’s Hot Survivor Babe Sarah (Adria Arjona), kush curator Heather (Trew Mullen) and a coder from the block named Camilla (Liz Caribel Sierra).

Hipster chef Cody (Simon Rex) seems like a devoted boyfriend to Sarah, while zaddy photographer Vic (Christian Slater) and incel vibes Tom (Haley Joel Osment) are just along for the ride.

As a gay man who prefers ladies nights to tech bro boozing, Lucas (Levon Hawke) isn’t sure where he fits in yet.

What everyone has in common is that they are here to amuse Slater King, especially his scatter-brained assistant/sister Stacy (Geena Davis), who never failed to keep me guessing.

As soon as they step off the plane, aesthetics suggest that the resort is charming on the outside but sinister within—the perfect metaphor for our host. Slater’s dominion is constructed with imposing red, white and black structures. All blood and shadows. A bold contrast to the lush, overgrown jungle and teal pool.

It’s important to pay attention to the colors, lines and people who stand out. Like the Indigenous maid with a serpent tattooed on her arm, warning Frida of something we can’t yet translate. The groundskeepers smile but won’t speak to the guests. And while Slater’s circle all sport flowy, beachy white ensembles laid out for them each day by the staff, Jess wraps herself in a big yellow towel. Her bright sunny color palette doesn’t fit in here, and she’s going to pay for it.

The fact that women often return to the arms of their abusers is one of the film’s most complex themes. We allow amnesia to set in, yet something deep within us never forgets.

Tensions brew as Sarah spies through frames at Frida and Slater, suggesting a cat fight over Magic Mike is nigh. The bad vibes keep coming. A generator crashes, forcing them to get drunk by candlelight. Frida spills wine on her perfect white dress, then wakes up to no stains. One minute the girls race across a blue moonlit manicured lawn, the next they’re sprinting under a white hot sun with no one chasing them. They start waking up with dirt under their nails, bruises under their eyes. Characters start a sentence—but then we cut to the next day, their train of thought disrupted.

Adam Newport-Berra’s cinematography and Kathryn J. Schubert’s editing are in a tango, moving us back and forth to a downbeat that constantly shifts beneath our feet. Yet the film’s funky soundtrack is so dang catchy. Like the characters, Kravitz urges us to have a good time dancing through a maze of red flags.

At the movie’s midpoint… Jess vanishes. Instead of finally ringing the alarm, everyone insists to Frida that Jess never existed. The second half of the film shows Frida unraveling the mystery of our waking nightmare at a terrifying speed.

My favorite scene in the movie takes place when Sarah, for all her jealous mean girl energy, comes to Frida’s room to return Jess’ yellow lighter. While Sarah struggles to recall a face to the name, she believes Frida anyway. Sarah’s immediate alignment with her old frenemy is genuinely more shocking than all the bloodfare that follows. We don’t waste time watching one woman doubt the other. They don’t compete for who is the most right or the most traumatized. No big twist backstabbing to win Slater’s favor. A woman says she feels unsafe and, moments later, the other woman offers support.

I won’t get into the mechanics of how Frida and Sarah reveal Slater’s schemes blunt by blunt—you should watch the movie for that. It’s a cathartic ride that starts slow and mysterious but ultimately pulls us over a cliff, all the way to a shockingly gory Chaka Khan-laced conclusion that reminds us…

Not all women are allies. 

Not all men are predators. 

But some get away with acts of sexual violence akin to murder.

And when survivors band together, we’re going to do more than just dance on your table. In the blink of an eye, we’ll turn your private island into your personal hell.