TRAIN WRECK ISSUE-there's yet another consideration from viewing this film to add: the "corpus delecti" problem, our wench needs to provide a body to successfully frame her husband.
In the first person voice-over and imagery, she sees herself bound and sinking to a watery grave, presumably lost. Thereby completing her murder-wrap ruse successfully!
In the second-third sequence, she makes "friends" with a suitably-sized younger brunette. (Teamed with her BF, she ultimately robs our villain of her money - forcing her to turn to the Neil Patrick Harris character, the ex-BF.)
The tense situation has us wondering how the "frame-up" can be pulled-off in a day and age of DNA-fingerprinting. Because it really can't.
What's strange is that for such a smart pre-murderous psychopath, so methodical in her plotting, she hasn't yet revealed her staging of the DNA evidence she needs to fulfill her evil schemes!
The obvious sacrifice for a still-beautiful woman to make does not take place: cutting off her toe to plant as evidence implicating the husband to seal the prior blood evidence at home.
Presumably, the theft of her money sets up the turn away from self-mutilation she needed to complete her 'get-away' goal of a successful frame of the husband. It is a random event that's nicely conveyed as a schemer out schemed by another female (abetted by the overpowering, big and intimidating BF).
At way rate, it added suspense to this surprise turn of events, increasing the voyeuristic "train-wreck" fascination at watching events unfold for me.
The Cohen brothers would have strung this out better, methinks. This plot twist leaves an obvious "evil, evil!" plot-ending undeveloped - a mistake the great suspense directors like Hitchcock - or French masters from Truffaut to Chabrol and Henri-Georges Clouzot - would not have missed.
Truffaut and Clouzot, in particular, loved the evil murdering woman as subject and protagonists in their films. For the former, it took a black comic turn in the revenge-driven "The Bride Wore Black," as well as the happy-go-lucky femme-fatale psycho-killer cum farce in "Such a Gorgeous Kid Like Me," which sees the seduced, nebbish criminologist-interviewer ultimately framed for murder as the young woman goes free!
Since we're close to Holloween, if any reader has a chance to see "Les Diaboliques" - do so. Or any of the (frankly inferior) American remakes from 1996 "Diabolique," or the TV-movie "House of Secrets" (1993) and even earlier "Reflections of Murder" (1974) - all useful tasters to get acquainted with a master's masterpiece of psychologically driven murder cum horror film.
Perhaps Fincher, together with the novelist, can serve the worthy goal of opening up Hollywood to better reconsiderations of the female psycho-killer theme on film? A revival long-overdue.
In the first person voice-over and imagery, she sees herself bound and sinking to a watery grave, presumably lost. Thereby completing her murder-wrap ruse successfully!
In the second-third sequence, she makes "friends" with a suitably-sized younger brunette. (Teamed with her BF, she ultimately robs our villain of her money - forcing her to turn to the Neil Patrick Harris character, the ex-BF.)
The tense situation has us wondering how the "frame-up" can be pulled-off in a day and age of DNA-fingerprinting. Because it really can't.
What's strange is that for such a smart pre-murderous psychopath, so methodical in her plotting, she hasn't yet revealed her staging of the DNA evidence she needs to fulfill her evil schemes!
The obvious sacrifice for a still-beautiful woman to make does not take place: cutting off her toe to plant as evidence implicating the husband to seal the prior blood evidence at home.
Presumably, the theft of her money sets up the turn away from self-mutilation she needed to complete her 'get-away' goal of a successful frame of the husband. It is a random event that's nicely conveyed as a schemer out schemed by another female (abetted by the overpowering, big and intimidating BF).
At way rate, it added suspense to this surprise turn of events, increasing the voyeuristic "train-wreck" fascination at watching events unfold for me.
The Cohen brothers would have strung this out better, methinks. This plot twist leaves an obvious "evil, evil!" plot-ending undeveloped - a mistake the great suspense directors like Hitchcock - or French masters from Truffaut to Chabrol and Henri-Georges Clouzot - would not have missed.
Truffaut and Clouzot, in particular, loved the evil murdering woman as subject and protagonists in their films. For the former, it took a black comic turn in the revenge-driven "The Bride Wore Black," as well as the happy-go-lucky femme-fatale psycho-killer cum farce in "Such a Gorgeous Kid Like Me," which sees the seduced, nebbish criminologist-interviewer ultimately framed for murder as the young woman goes free!
Since we're close to Holloween, if any reader has a chance to see "Les Diaboliques" - do so. Or any of the (frankly inferior) American remakes from 1996 "Diabolique," or the TV-movie "House of Secrets" (1993) and even earlier "Reflections of Murder" (1974) - all useful tasters to get acquainted with a master's masterpiece of psychologically driven murder cum horror film.
Perhaps Fincher, together with the novelist, can serve the worthy goal of opening up Hollywood to better reconsiderations of the female psycho-killer theme on film? A revival long-overdue.
“There is no global anthem, no global currency, no certificate of global citizenship. We pledge allegiance to one flag, and that flag is the American flag!” -DJT