The Woman (2011)
Directed by Lucky McKee
A lawyer puts his family in jeopardy when he captures the last member of a violent clan and tries to forcibly tame her.
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What critics say influenced The Woman
Cleek, a creepy dad in the vein of Terry O'Quinn in The Stepfather (1987), drags the wild child to his cellar, where he chains her in a crucifixion stance, intent on "rehabilitating" her.
In a way, she�s like Clint Eastwood�s anti-hero in High Plains Drifter, kicking up the dust that has settled over the lies.
Filmmaker Lucky McKee, whose name makes him sound like a fun-loving leprechaun, was previously best known for 2002’s creepy May, about a lonely young woman with a most unusual hobby.
Then there's mom Belle (Angela Bettis, "May"), a shyly smiling Stepford Wife.
Let’s not speculate on the reasons for that; there was a moment, circa the director’s impressively creepy 2002 debut, May, when he was thought of as an intelligent new voice in a ghettoized genre.
His wife (Angela Bettis, who wowed horror fans in McKee�s debut May) has seen a lot but chooses to say nothing.
The story, adapted by horror director Lucky McKee (May) from co-writer Jack Ketchum's novella, depicts in garish style a family that captures a wild woman to make her an object of spectacle, sex and torture.
In films like the striking “May” and “Red,” McKee has shown an unusual flair for summoning dread and horror from curious places and angles, and part of the genius of “The Woman” is that it is the exact opposite of gleefully deranged.
(Given that she’s tied up through most of the picture, there’s little more she’s able to do.) It’s a brave, unglamorous performance that exposes Jodie Foster’s “Nell” for the goofy, theatrical sham that it is.
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There are also subtexts about the ways in which men oppress women to keep them locked inside specific societal roles, but come on: You want a feminist movie, go rent Norma Rae.
In "The Woman," the suburban ennui of 1999's " American Beauty " collides head-on with the graphically violent nature of 2005's " High Tension ," and the results are nothing short of excitingly unique, deeply disturbing, and seductively macabre.
As Chris, Sean Bridgers (2002's " Sweet Home Alabama ") is disquieting in his own right by so convincingly essaying the kind of evil soul that exists in one's everyday surroundings.
Scottish actress McIntosh, who resembles Milla beneath her organic grime, gives a fierce, physical performance with a guttural voice a step between human and Mercedes McCambridge's "The Exorcist" vocals.
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Despite some critics and viewers championing The Woman as a serious feminist film, it barely stands its ground before such works as Abdellatif Kechich's Black Venus and Brilliante Mendoza's Kinatay.
Long delayed and with good reason, The Woods is a well-made yet thoroughly impenetrable riff on Dario Argento's Suspiria from up-and-coming genre filmmaker Lucky McKee.
There was an oft-delayed, tossed-aside studio film in the interim (2006's misguided "The Woods"), a quirky episode of "Masters of Horror" entitled "Sick Girl," and an effective if little-seen Jack Ketchum adaptation, 2008's "Red."
His third tale to date of a peculiar young woman violently finding her role in the world — fourth, if weâre counting his Masters of Horror episode — the filmmaker has demonstrated a distinct feminist streak throughout his work, but while May offered up a Gothic sense of romance and relationships and The Woods skewed toward more classical interpretations of the supernatural, The Woman is a languid, obvious thing that falls more in line with his aforementioned TV effort.