Search - In the Cut (Unrated Director's Cut) on DVD

A Darkly Erotic Thriller!

Jana L. Perskie | New York, NY USA | 04/03/2004

(4 out of 5 stars)

""In The Cut" is an adaptation of Susanna Moore's excellent novel of the same title, published in 1995. Director Jane Campion has departed significantly from the novel in several places, especially with the ending, but has managed to capture much of the book's eroticism, dark edginess, and palpable suspense.Frannie Avery, superbly acted by Meg Ryan, is an attractive 35 year-old divorcee who lives in a two room apartment on Washington Square. She teaches creative writing at NYU to a group of inner-city teens. She is also a connoisseur and scholar of language and is writing a book on street slang and its derivatives. Frannie takes chances. She is a sexual risk taker. However, she lives in her own private world where she spends an incredible amount of time pondering the nature of language, which leaves her vulnerable to her surroundings...and reality. Frannie is not at all street savvy. And her nearsightedness allows her to disengage even more from the potentially dangerous world in which she lives. One late afternoon, in a neighborhood bar, she makes a trip to the ladies room and inadvertently walks-in on a couple engaged in an intimate act. The man's face is obscured by shadow but she does notice that he has a unique tattoo on the inside of his wrist. A few days later a NYC homicide detective, James E. Malloy (Mark Ruffalo), seeks Frannie out for an interview. There has been a brutal murder in the neighborhood. The victim is the woman Frannie saw performing the sex act in the bar. The evening Frannie saw her was her last.

Malloy takes risks also. He totally defies all rules about relationships between a detective and potential witness and acts on the tremendous sexual attraction between Frannie and himself. Malloy epitomizes the "tough guy with a badge," his frank blunt language adding to Frannie's turn-on. From the first, however, she knew that Malloy had a tattoo on his wrist - a tattoo she had seen once before.Jennifer Jason Leigh plays Pauline, Frannie's spacey, obsessive half-sister and the person Frannie is closest to and loves. She lives above a topless bar in downtown Manhattan and the affection both women feel for the erotic dancers, the entire ambiance of the club and its proximity to their lives, reestablishes the sense of careless oblivion to danger. Together the two ponder the ups and downs of being female, discuss sexuality and romance and their father's many foibles.Kevin Bacon is Frannie's off-the-wall ex-boyfriend who stalks her and maintains a threatening presence throughout. And Sharrieff Pugh is excellent as one of Frannie's brightest students who is fixated upon John Wayne Gacy. Jane Campion, an extraordinary director, has not given us a typical mystery thriller about a vicious serial killer. "In The Cut" is more an exploration of the sexuality and inner life of an intelligent, creative, emotionally starved women approaching middle age. Detective Mallory's aggressive masculinity and the threat of the physical danger which surrounds her jar Frannie awake. The films portrays an urban environment of muted violence just waiting to explode and the colors and sounds of Campion's New York add to the building tension. There are some superbly staged sequences which give a hallucinatory, almost nightmarish quality to the scenes. The intense and honest performances really compensate for the movie's flaws. I found myself totally absorbed. Recommended - but be warned, this is not a movie for the sqeamish or faint of heart!
JANA"

A trip into a kinky sexual underworld.

M. J Leonard | Silver Lake, Los Angeles, CA United States | 08/03/2004

(3 out of 5 stars)

"I must confess, that Susanna Moore's novella is probably one of the most memorable books that I've ever read. I loved its raw sexual intensity, its dark, dangerous sexual underworld, and the fact that it never compromised and shied away from the smut-ridden side of life. This movie version, directed by Jane Campion, and starring Meg Ryan and Mark Ruffalo is, from the outset, a pretty accurate account of the book. But I'm in two minds about this movie - there is no doubt that it's an honest portrayal of graphic sleaze, but the movie ultimately suffers from a kind of arty pretentiousness, and a monotone, almost dazed performance by Meg Ryan. The movie isn't as bad as all the critics are saying it is, but it will probably only remain memorable for no other reason than as a showpiece for Meg's boobs and lank hair.



In the Cut offers a psychological character study wrapped in a murder mystery, where the identity of the villain is not the focus of the movie. The film does have an unconventional power and there is certainly some depth and innovation - witness New York burnished in vibrant colours of burnt orange and gold. Meg Ryan is Frannie Thurston, an accomplished English professor and intelligent lover of words. She discovers that she has a sexual hunger that has gone unsatisfied for too long, when one afternoon, while tutoring one of her students, she wanders into the dimly lit basement of a club and happens upon a man and woman having oral sex.



She notices that the woman has long blue fingernails and the man, an unusual tattoo. Shortly thereafter, she is told there is a serial killer on the loose and that parts of the latest victim were found in her own garden As the killer threatens to strike again, she discovers that the murder victim had blue fingernails and that Detective Giovanni Malloy (Mark Ruffalo), the policeman who's investigating the crime, has the same tattoo on exactly the same part of his body. As Frannie becomes involved with Malloy her pent-up sex drive gets a sudden fetishistic jump-start of its own. She can't stop her dangerous sexual relationship with Malloy even though she suspects that he may well be the psychopath.



So Meg and Mark appear nude in several important scenes, and they have sex in her strangely lit, shadowy and out-of focus apartment. And although Meg's nudity is somewhat contrived, she does a good job during the first half of the film with an understated, subtle performance. Frannie is a complex, desperate, but flawed character, and Ryan effectively shows her naivety, and at times, stupidity. She knows her relationship with Malloy is inappropriate, but she gains a sort of carnal satisfaction and internal strength from her own newly discovered masochism. Mark Ruffalo is terrific as Malloy - he has a gruff sexiness, a blue-collar chic and suave, seductive coolness that is absolutely riveting to watch. Jennifer Jason Lee is also pretty good as Fannie's tortured sister Pauline. Leigh brings compassion and a quiet sadness to Pauline, whose desperate attempts to find her one true love has gotten stalking charges put on her.



The camerawork is, at times, too jittery and self consciously arty. And people are constantly bathed in dark hues, so sometimes it's a struggle to see what is going on. Frannie also does some really silly things, like wondering along deserted, garbage-strewn back alleys late at night when she's already been told that a serial killer is on the loose. In the Cut may be nothing more than a kinky, R-rated romp, a late night soft-core porn thriller masquerading as an art piece. Yet, with all its sexual provocativeness, there is something definitely likable about the film - this viewer, however, is still not quite sure what it is. Mike Leonard August 04.









"