The Woman

I was excited to see this film from the start. The opening scene is quite a hook. The performance from the woman is superb. The story line is fresh and never has to long of a boring beat. The performance of the rest of the cast is well above industry standard. I can't tell you how refreshing it is to see a movie like this hit my screen. Perhaps my favorite part of the movie is how (Wait for the dominating gun shot) the way the audio engineers "Foley artists" and actor's performances draw you into feeling this movie. It's one of those flicks, you get so into it.. you simply forget that you're watching a movie. This movie builds suspense cinematically, "There are no gimmicks here folks" its good old fashion cinematic suspense. We're talking all story and visuals, no special effects to rely on. No James Cameron budget, but we get a more powerful movie than, (The only comparison I could find to it) Black Snake Moan. OK so you get the idea, go watch it already!

Where's Mike and his robot friends when you need them? The Woman is point at the screen, shake your head in disbelief bad. Poor production values, wretched lighting, horrible editing, screamingly bad pop song placement, shot on really, really crappy digital video. The acting ranges from competent (Bettis) to terrible (everyone else) to * grade (whoever played the teacher). The ending is so rushed and moronic, all the carnage is there just to provide a cheap easy ending so the filmmakers and writers (I'm looking at you Ketchum) could shy away from any truly challenging and difficult content. Showing badly filmed gore is grounds for laughter, not providing a point. This movie was awful. Bottom of the barrel. Who besides grade Z film investors would entrust McKee with any reasonable budget after producing something this low rent? F

The Woman arrives on DVD and Bluray amidst almost a year of controversy and festival runs. The picture was accused of misogyny, horrific violence, and bad music. Two of these three things are true. Let's just say certain musical selections don't really make sense in a film of this subject, and the violence will surely have innocents running for the door. "The Woman" sports a deeply feminist view upon domestic violence and the domination of man over women in contemporary society. However the film does not focus it's killer's eyes on the disturbing, horrible men featured here. A crucial moment underlines the idea that we all have the power to change a lurid situation drastically, and if you do not seize that opportunity, you are just as guilty as an aggressor. My heart broke for all the women in this film, including the titular cannibal. They endure some of the worst male behavior ever seen in a suburban, or civilized, society and the violence that embeds the last half hour is blunt and brutal. Director Lucky McKee injects so much energy into this film, but he doesn't glorify the violence. It's the audience's choice, myself included, to crack a smile when certain characters get what's coming to them. Prepare to be made uncomfortable, disturbed, scared, and finally short of breath by The Woman.

For the first 10 minutes of The Woman I thought that it will be yet another low-budget horror movie, of the too crowded "torturing genre" (there are dozens of movies of that type because they can fit in a very low budget, just some red paint and fake body parts :)). Then the plot suddenly grabs you, you have a clue about how it will end and you really really hope that it will end this way. *spoilers* This is a very strong movie, centralized around the concept of the strength of the human nature - not the weak and/or mind crippled "end product" of the 21st century, but the pure "core" of it. This is where the difference between this and the other movies starts. Usually, the victim of the killer-freak breaks instantly, getting into panic, horror and so on. Here, The Woman just can't be broken - she sees all of this just as another battle for survival, the thing she does all her life. She doesn't have a feeling for good/evil, just for what is right and wrong. All of the actors play especially strong, showing (as I see it) all possible types of reactions to the madness of their world (coming from the pretty messed up father, think of it as Dexter, but at the same time exactly the opposite of Dexter). The mother, who wants to protect his children, but is too afraid to stand up against her husband. The son, who got messed up just like his father. The big daughter which is in constant shock and horror, and the little daughter who is trying "to block" by not acknowledging the evil (she is too old not to be able to understand all of this, and she never cried or got afraid, even in the brutal scenes). At the end of the movie, The Woman prevails in the situation too quick (I was expecting a longer battle), but, I think that is the right way to do it - she is just too good compared to the father and the son - they are just the typical mad people, they don't have what she has. I find the contrast between her and the human-dog thing a very nice final touch to the movie. Without it, it would seem that the movie makes a comparison between the father, an educated human-beast and her, an uneducated beast. But she clearly shows that she has more humanity than the father, and more humanity than the dog-freak. Also I liked how she took care of the father - at the beginning, with the ring, she gave him that special look of determination while she ate part of him, and at the end she looked him the same way, as saying "told you it will end that way". The sound effects are superb, and the standard visual horror special effects are used carefully, so they are OK too. The movie could use some more suspense in the last 20 minutes of it, and a better first scene. Definitely take a look at it :)

The person who wrote the previous review on here was so anal i had to join to write a review based on the view of an average movie goer. This is a flick so cleverly presented that the viewer does not realize what is going on till well into the film..Basically most horror films have tons of over the top guys with beards and tattoo's and guns taking advantage of four high school kids...In this lovely film, it is a "normal" whatever that is, family of five,who because of the father ,capture a woman and keep her in the basement. Without giving anything away, it is the first time the genre has been presented this way. The direction and camera angles keeps the suspense going.You identify with ALL the characters,you root for the good guys and boo the bad guys and don't know until the end what is going to happen.Thrilling story, excellent camera-work, the music that the young girl was listening to was her world, so you clicked with her when it came on. I loved this film. DEnnis

I went into this movie knowing absolutely nothing about it other than that it was based on a book. I was shocked by what I saw, but in a very good way. I watch a lot of horror movies, and while I do enjoy most of them, it does get rather boring watching the same ole plots get rehashed and redone. Finally we are given something new and just plain out insane. The story itself was very original, but the execution is truly what was the best about this whole film. They do such a good job of just presenting you with a family that you hardly ever see in these types of movies. A dysfunctional who appears normal is something that has been portrayed in horror films in the past, but this film does it in a way that will just shock and awe you. The score for the film is actually pretty great. It was full of songs im sure pretty much nobody has ever heard before. Every single song really did a good job of complimenting the mood of each scene, however some of the songs did seem a bit out of place. There were some pretty gross scenes, but nothing you haven't seen before. I did see the youtube video of the man complaining about the content of this film. I do not believe that he was a plant since I do kind of see where he is coming from, but the movie is not nearly as disturbing as he makes it out to be. My review makes this this movie out to be the prefect horror film, but it did have its faults. It does start to get a tad boring towards the middle, but it does end up picking up pretty well. Also, the ending seemed a bit rushed. This was a very enjoyable horror film. I recommend it to someone who is just tired of the same ole same ole crap. Give it a try, you won't be disappointed. 8/10