Film / Greta

Don't take the bait.

Greta is a 2018 Irish-American psychological thriller directed by Neil Jordan. It was theatrically released on 1 March 2019 in the United States, by Focus Features.

The film stars Chloë Grace Moretz as Frances McCullen, a young woman who befriends eccentric French piano teacher Greta Hideg, played by Isabelle Huppert, who becomes disturbingly obsessed with her.

---

Tropes

• Abusive Parents: Greta is implied to have been this to her daughter, who committed suicide. Along with that, her girlfriend speculates she herself suffered from extreme abuse as a child, giving her references to being "put in a box" (something she had later done to victims).
• Actor Allusion: Isabelle Huppert as a French Piano Teacher
• All Just a Dream: Subverted. It initially appears that Frances’s abduction was something she dreamt after falling asleep on the couch. But then she wakes up in a box, and, no, the abduction was real and the Hope Spot was the dream.
• As Long as It Sounds Foreign: Isabelle Huppert's Hungarian is remarkably bad, which might sound even more amusing to native speakers, when Greta tries correct Frances' pronounciation of mézeskalács (gingerbread). Also, because of previously addressing Frances as angyalom (my angel), Greta's scream of "My kisujj!" is very unlikely from a native, as screaming "A kisujjam!" (my pinky) would sound definitely more realistic. ^note There are no determiners like my in Hungarian, as it uses only possessive suffixes (my angel → angyalom, my pinky → kisujjam etc.). It's highly unlikely that a native speaker would produce such an idiosyncratic sentence.
• Barefoot Captives: After Greta abducts Frances, she confiscates her shoes, forcing her to spend the rest of the movie barefoot.
• Big Damn Heroes: Erica at the end when she dresses up to fool Greta, manipulates her way into the house, and then attacks and drugs her to save Frances.
• Bilingual Bonus: After it turns out that Greta isn't French at all, she starts to use more and more Hungarian words and expressions: in the restaurant she says "Miután mindent megtettem érted!" (After everything I've done for you!), later she addresses Frances as angyalom (my angel), uses the words kisujj (pinky), mézeskalács (gingerbread), ragadós (sticky), and states that "Ez tényleg fáj." (It really hurts.), while treating her wound. Also-also, her surname, Hideg means cold in Hungarian.
  Park Hill Waitress: Was she talking Klingon?
  
• Bittersweet Ending: Erica rescues Frances from Greta and the two dump Greta in a chest. However, when the two leave, Greta starts to escape.
  • Averted in that they can just lock the door behind them.
• Bound and Gagged: Frances is restrained like this after her first escape attempt.
• Deadly Euphemism:
  Greta: [to Morton] You don't want to end up a euphemism.
  
• Fingore: Frances cuts off Greta's pinkie by slamming it into a cookie cutter with a rolling pin.
• Foreshadowing: Greta is constantly listening to and playing Liszt. Liszt is one of the most famous, if not the most famous Hungarian composer, which is a clue of Greta's real background.
• Not the First Victim: While being stalked by Greta, Frances learns from Greta's daughter's girlfriend that Greta seemed to have been extremely abusive to her daughter. It's never explicitly confirmed because she's a Posthumous Character, having committed suicide prior to the events of the film. It's also heavily implied that Greta had multiple victims because Frances hears the same banging through the wall at the beginning of the film that she later makes while bound to the bed in Greta's house. Later, she finds the previous girl in the basement — still alive, but just barely, and Greta quickly finishes her off.
• Oh, Crap!: Erica and Frances’s father share one when they realise they were both fooled into thinking Frances was with the other.
• Poirot Speak: Greta speaks English with a French accent, however later it turns out that she was faking it all along.
  Alexa Hammond: Listen, that whole French shtick of Greta's is an affectation, all right? She's from Hungary.
  
• Stalker without a Crush: Greta seems to want a daughter replacement that she can abuse, and has no romantic or sexual interest in Frances.
• Wham Line: At the end of the film, Greta lures another girl into the house and after they share some tea, Greta begins to feel faint. And then this ensues:
  Greta: I feel strange. *as we see Frances Bound and Gagged on the bed
  Girl (now without the accent): D-do you think you may have been drugged? Think that happened to a friend of mine, once. pulls off wig, revealing herself to be Erica as she undoes her hair. The hours and hours I searched the subway for that goddamned bag. So, what happens now?