A TALENT FOR MURDER

A Talent for Murder Turns Patricia Highsmith Into Part of the Mystery

Patricia Highsmith created one of literature's most famous killers.

Now someone wants her to bring him back.

Helen Mirren stars as the acclaimed author in A Talent for Murder, a psychological thriller that imagines a mysterious encounter late in Highsmith's life.

Living in Switzerland and seemingly finished with Tom Ripley, the charming and dangerously amoral character she introduced in The Talented Mr. Ripley, Highsmith has little interest in returning to the series that became some of her best-known work.

Then a young man arrives from New York.

Played by Alden Ehrenreich, he's been sent by Highsmith's publisher with one assignment:

Convince her to write one final Ripley novel.

What begins as a literary negotiation gradually becomes something considerably more unsettling.

Inside Highsmith's secluded world, the two enter a tense battle of personalities as the young agent's determination to get what he came for begins taking a darker turn.

And when persuasion isn't enough, his methods become increasingly difficult to separate from the kind of behavior Highsmith herself might have written into one of her thrillers.

Directed by Anton Corbijn, A Talent for Murder turns the relationship between an author and her creation into part of the suspense, placing the woman who imagined Tom Ripley inside a psychological game worthy of the character himself.

Patricia Highsmith spent decades writing about manipulation, obsession and murder.

Now she may be trapped in someone else's thriller.

A Talent for Murder arrives exclusively in theaters October 23, 2026.