Women Talking (2022) How does one create a universal, raw, bleeding snapshot of women suffering at the hands of men?
Director Sarah Polley sure as hell knew the answer......find a specific group of women thrown together in one confined space, all of them forced into debating their core beliefs.....and boldly deciding on their own future fates, a privilege unheard of for them.
Next step......assemble a stellar cast of gifted actresses to engage with each other while representing the collective courage of womanhood living with the constant, violent threat from a patriarchal society imprisoning them..
To put together all these elements she'd need for such a film, Polly used a novel based on a bizarre true event - a group of Mennonite women choosing to rebel against an onslaught of rape from the men of their religious sect.
Gathered together in a barn, they've narrowed down their choices to three options......stay and do nothing, stay and fight against any further assaults.......or flee the sect altogether, taking along their children who've also been brutally victimized.
With this set of strange, one-of-a-kind circumstances in place, Polley presents her ensemble of actresses a golden opportunity to run through a full gamut of rage, resignation, and even a few moments of dark humor.
In fact, these woman become so compelling, so fiercely intelligent in their portrayals, they undo the premise of the film. After listening to them for over an hour and a half, it's hard for me to swallow that they've fully bought into the cult's unforgiving commandment - that if they leave the group, they give up their place in heaven.
Not only that, given the obscene abuse they and their children have been subjected to, why would they need to debate fleeing as fast as humanly possible? If this bonkers cult has so scrambled their brains, turning them into kool-aid drinkers who think rape's part of their daily duties, why would they even bother discussing options at all?..... just sayin'........
As much as I deeply admire the work done by the film's cast, I couldn't help asking myself all of those above questions........and certainly the film's measured pace and non-stop conversation gives a viewer plenty of time to contemplate those issues.
Not an easy film to sit through......and problematic on all those multiple levels. But cinephiles will savor the vast skill of the performances and shouldn't let this one get past them......3 stars (***). .
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