December 5, 2007
The Girl nex Door (2007)
The Girl Next Door
Ketchum fictionalizes true life crime stories, and this book and movie are based on the following true story.
"In 1960's Indiana, Sylvia Likens and her little sister moved in with Gertrude Baniszewski while their parents went out of town. Baniszewski, her children, and several neighborhood children tortured and eventually murdered Likens over a period of months. At the trial, the children involved in the crime got off with an insignificant punishment, leading to outbursts of rage among the community and anyone with an ounce of moral fiber. In what must surely rank as one of our justice system's lowest moments, Gertrude herself was eventually released from prison, dying peacefully several years later somewhere in Iowa. This case serves as the loose outline for Ketchum's diabolical novel."
Like several of the reviewers, I had no idea what I was walking into. I had not known about the true life crime it was based upon, only that Netflix has it listed under thriller, says the girls suffer unthinkable abuse at the hands of their Aunt Ruthie and her 3 sons.
I had absolutely no idea what I had rented. I figured creepy story, the girls would be made house cleaning slaves, beaten, maybe eventually murdered.
I was not prepared for the very graphic horror I saw on my screen.
This movie is not for the faint of heart.
I am someone who can watch horror movies 24 hours a day, slashers, Freddy, Jason, all of those big bad meanies, this was so much worse, so much more terror than I was ready for.
Blanche Baker who portrays the evil Aunt Ruth Chandler, no I should say, the sadistic, severely mental Aunt Ruth, portrayed this character so well, I hated her. I wanted to reach through my screen and slap her, kill her myself.
What she put Meg through, the torture, the sexual abuse and mutilation, what she put her 3 sons through convincing them to help her, the other children in the neighborhood who all helped beat, rape, and torture Meg, was just so cruel, the darkest part of human nature I have ever seen in a movie.
I watch a lot of horror films, I've seen characters die in the most horrific ways, but this has left me shaken to the core still 2 hours after finishing watching it.
I sat here with my mouth agape for the entire movie after reading the words on the screen that said this was based on true events, just saying no over and over again.
The prologue of the movie, we see David, a grown man sitting at a table looking at a water color, narrating the beginning of his story.
He says, "When my second wife was 19, she got in between a couple of fighting cats, and one of them went at her--climbed her like a tree, tore gashes out of her thighs and breasts and belly that you can still see today. She got 30 stitches and a fever that lasted for days. My second wife says, 'That's pain.' She doesn't know fucking pain, that woman."
He wasn't minimizing her pain, but indeed, she truly didn't know pain.
What Meg suffered was some of the most graphic, without actually showing us, pain I have ever seen inflicted on a character ever.
I wouldn't recommend this for everyone, no, not everyone will be able to watch this, it is truly a dark film, a sad and frightening story of a woman with mental illness who pushed her illness on her own children and her nieces who she was left to care for.
It is a brutal film, very hard to watch, I covered my mouth, my eyes, I cried out no several times.
But in all of it's horror, all of it's darkness, it was an incredible film. The young actors who starred did incredible jobs, Baker was chilling, and Blythe Auffarth who played Meg, deserves an Oscar for her performance.
Truly an amazing film, but not for everyone.
