R | 1h 40m | Crime, Thriller, Comedy | 2025
“Sew Torn,” directed by Freddy Macdonald, is an eccentric, whimsical crime thriller that’s not a time-loop movie, but may appeal to those who enjoy choose-your-own-adventure novels.
Barbara (Eve Connolly), a beautiful, introverted, and anxious American living in Switzerland, runs a sewing supply shop and a mobile seamstress business that her mother left her after she died.
Which Scenario?
Much like the 1999 German movie “Run Lola Run,” three very different timelines are presented: 1) commit the perfect crime, 2) call the police, or 3) just drive away. Which do you fancy?The film’s main conceit and artifice (and fun) is the revelation that Barbara is a seamstress version of big wall rock climber. She’s got fancy knots, she knows pulleys, anchoring, hauling, and grappling-iron techniques, but on a Lilliputian scale.
And so, utilizing only the contents of her mobile sewing kit, she outwits, outsmarts, and outguns the bad guys with elaborate Rube Goldberg-esque contraptions. She can rig a makeshift blow gun, blow a threaded needle across a room, and set a booby-trap. Or reel in a pistol without getting fingerprints on it. Only instead of a 9.5mm climbing rope, carabiners, and ice axes, she uses thread and sewing needles. Most of Barbara’s little contraptions aren’t traced out in enough detail to be persuasive, but enough to be able to suspend disbelief, if only for the sake of comedy.
The Bad Guys
The drug dealer and drug buyer are Joshua (Calum Worthy) and Beck (Thomas Douglas), respectively. Sometimes they’re Barbara’s allies, sometimes they’re antagonists, but in every timeline she has to deal with Hudson (John Lynch), the drug-dealing head honcho, who demeans and verbally abuses both her, and Joshua, his son.It’s only when the last domino falls that you fully understand these elaborate, inventive, and unique ways of clobbering criminals with simple household objects. But in the same way all the thread-centric gizmos, contraptions, and strategies gloss over establishing realism and stretch credibility to the max, the entire blackly comedic and surprisingly violent yarn, er, thread, is kind of threadbare—lots of loose ends.
Ultimately, not all will find this far-fetched concept agreeable. The film’s main error is revealing the outcome of each particular story-thread in the film’s opening moments. When it’s evident each discrete section won’t end well, it dulls the suspense, which is why talking about it here isn’t really a spoiler. But “Sew Torn” is more about the journey than the destination, and viewers who can appreciate the whimsy and idiosyncratic inventiveness will enjoy the ride.
Also, there’s a more profound theme at work here, whether intentional or not. In Norse mythology, the Norns—Urd, Veroandi, and Skuld—are the three goddesses who govern destiny. Living at the foot of Yggdrasil, the World Tree, the Norns tirelessly weave the tapestry of human fate, with each string representing a life, and the string’s length representing brevity or longevity.
Each of Barbara’s life threads ends badly. Why? Could it be that because, regardless of the scenario, the overwhelming desire to abscond with that briefcase full of money, and the cold, calculated, lack of remorse behind her ruthless string-pulling—is the constant? Could it be that the karma emanating from those thoughts unswervingly leads her back to the same outcome, until such time when she divests herself of them via harsh life lessons? If that’s intentionally what’s going on here, that’s pretty brilliant.
