Piercing (2018) review

Reed (Christopher Abbott), who has a wife (Laia Costa) and a newborn, has trouble resisting the temptation to stab the baby with an icepick (!?) so he goes to a hotel and hires an escort (Mia Wasikowska) with the intent of stabbing her instead ... except the lady of the night he gets is not the most stable individual in the world.  It's based on a novella by Ryû Murakami - one of my favorite writers because I love how he mixes morality with graphic behavior - and while the leads are fine, I feel like it misses a lot of the texture of the book (naturally), ending on a deadpan joke that makes what preceded it just some sadomasochistic novelty (in other words, read the original work and Best Murakami's take on shared damage).  On the bright side, this does show how much range Wasikowska has (instead of playing the innocent) and I can easily see her slotted into villainess roles sometime in the future.