Quartile rating: 5/10 · 1 rating
A bestselling female novelist, suffering from writer's block, hires an innocent young woman to watch over her twin children. As the novelist dangerously indulges in her new best seller, the line between the life she's writing and the one she's living becomes blurred.
Deadly Illusions is a Netflix thriller that leans heavily on familiar psychological thriller tropes — the unhinged nanny, the unreliable narrator, the steamy obsession — without executing any of them with particular skill or originality. The plot is muddled and relies on conveniences rather than clever construction, and the ending is widely criticized for being incoherent and unsatisfying, failing to pay off the ambiguity it sets up. The acting, particularly from Kristin Davis, is earnest but hamstrung by a weak script. Cinematography is serviceable but unremarkable. There is little that distinguishes it from countless similar direct-to-streaming thrillers, making it a largely derivative and forgettable entry in the genre.