Despite hearing some less than stellar reviews beforehand, I still walked into the theater today hoping that the film would at least give me a story with substance that could serve some meaningful insight to the audience. Not even halfway into the movie, I immediately realized that this was the wrong movie to watch if I hoped to get anything of the sort.
I'm only slightly exaggerating when I say that sitting in that cinema for nearly 2 hours straight felt like torture. Throughout the entire film, I felt as if the story was just repeatedly hammering into my head over and over again a message that I've known almost my entire life: that women everywhere continuously suffer at the hands of predatory, stain-of-the-earth men.
I didn't need to watch a single second of this to understand that the events which unfolded in the movie reflect millions of cases in the real world. I didn't need to sit through multiple harrowing, explicit scenes depicting rape to understand that these things do happen, and they happen often. In a medium where absolutely anything at all could happen, I didn't need the movie to depict an extremely realistic storyline telling the audience that rape is a very real issue in this world as if I don't get constantly reminded of that fact every single time I hear news of girls in my country getting assaulted and murdered simply for rejecting some guy she doesn't like.
In general, the film felt like an utter waste of time that didn't offer anything new to the table, especially from a male director who I pray isn't thinking that his film was revolutionary or told a new, enlightening story when it did the complete opposite. The singular saving grace of this movie was its final few minutes, where the rapist was finally unmasked and justice was "served" (even then, he got off very easy and didn't get even a thousandth of what he truly deserved for his despicable actions).
In truth, I left the theater not feeling enlightened or even saddened, I only felt unbridled rage that I had to experience this movie at all. I apologize for writing such a lengthy, messy review, but I had to write out my true feelings after witnessing that absolute shitshow. Maybe I'm being far too pessimistic, but the fact that this movie won multiple awards is frankly appaling to me.
Apart from the story, the movie was also lacking from a technical standpoint. I understand that this was the director's debut, but I struggle to wrap my head around how anyone could see some of the editing and transitions implemented in this film and thought it was passable. Still, much less of an offence compared to its story.
I'm only slightly exaggerating when I say that sitting in that cinema for nearly 2 hours straight felt like torture. Throughout the entire film, I felt as if the story was just repeatedly hammering into my head over and over again a message that I've known almost my entire life: that women everywhere continuously suffer at the hands of predatory, stain-of-the-earth men.
I didn't need to watch a single second of this to understand that the events which unfolded in the movie reflect millions of cases in the real world. I didn't need to sit through multiple harrowing, explicit scenes depicting rape to understand that these things do happen, and they happen often. In a medium where absolutely anything at all could happen, I didn't need the movie to depict an extremely realistic storyline telling the audience that rape is a very real issue in this world as if I don't get constantly reminded of that fact every single time I hear news of girls in my country getting assaulted and murdered simply for rejecting some guy she doesn't like.
In general, the film felt like an utter waste of time that didn't offer anything new to the table, especially from a male director who I pray isn't thinking that his film was revolutionary or told a new, enlightening story when it did the complete opposite. The singular saving grace of this movie was its final few minutes, where the rapist was finally unmasked and justice was "served" (even then, he got off very easy and didn't get even a thousandth of what he truly deserved for his despicable actions).
In truth, I left the theater not feeling enlightened or even saddened, I only felt unbridled rage that I had to experience this movie at all. I apologize for writing such a lengthy, messy review, but I had to write out my true feelings after witnessing that absolute shitshow. Maybe I'm being far too pessimistic, but the fact that this movie won multiple awards is frankly appaling to me.
Apart from the story, the movie was also lacking from a technical standpoint. I understand that this was the director's debut, but I struggle to wrap my head around how anyone could see some of the editing and transitions implemented in this film and thought it was passable. Still, much less of an offence compared to its story.
