Dorothy Mills

Although writer/director Agnès Merlet resorted to too many clichés at times, Dorothy Mills does deserve credit for not taking the Hollywood road of botching the conclusion with special effects or nonsensical action scenes.

The movie has a solid pacing and takes the time to acclimate us with its characters. Unfortunately, most of them are terribly uninteresting and look like they were inspired by similar movies.

There are two glowing exceptions: psychiatrist Jane Van Dopp and our title character: the young and troubled Dorthy Mills. Dutch actress Carice Van Houten (The Black Book, Valkyrie) has a lot of presence on screen and manages to showcase all the emotions the doctor goes through, without overacting. The script still doesn't really do the actress justice but she does relatively well, despite not being completely at ease with English.

Without a doubt the most pleasant surprise of the whole movie will be the performance of newcomer Jenn Murray as Dorothy. Knowing that this movie was small budget and comparing her performance with the rest of the cast, one can only be amazed by her raw talent and presence. The role of Dorothy is incredibly challenging and it would have been easy for the movie to become unintentionally funny had the actress playing Dorothy been only average. But on the contrary, Jenn Murray elevates the movie by at least a point or two.

The story is slightly conventional. A nice twist at the end has a good effect to it but feels kind of forced. Some dramatic scenes barely work. More than anything else, the plot is almost ruined by not letting Dorothy be the sole vehicle of the strange happenings on the island.

But this is still a cool mystery movie with an awesome performance by Murray, whom I look forward to seeing in many more films.

Sorry to disagree with some remarks of this movie being slow(?). I liked the pace of it and it gave you time to really understand the different characters and their secrets and lies. it added much needed depth to the story, something that is lacking in many Hollywood films.

I found that the film was always interesting, mysterious and in some scenes quite chilling. It is, by far one of the most refreshing films of the year. The acting was superb.

Another criticism that I found was uncalled for was the nit picking about the Dutch actress Carise's accent. Did you not notice her character's surname it's actually Dutch (Doh!)she is meant to have lived in Ireland for a while and therefore picked up the Irish accent I live in Glasgow,Scotland and in my city there are hundreds that have come to work in here from various cities of Europe and other parts of the world and there is one I know who is a German psychiatrist who has picked up a slight accent from staying here for a few years.

If you want to nit pick what about big Terminator Arnie's accent - it never changed in all his movies, how do you explain a German accented robot from the future?... Given that Carise's first language is Dutch I really admired that she managed to get the accent at all.

a solid and fresh story with great actings especially the 2 main leads.

2 surprising twists, one around the middle when you realize what is happening to dorothy and one in the end which explains it all, what makes it great is you do not see this coming, well at least i didn't.

remember that crappy movie with nicolas cage about a crazed community on an island ? well this is not at all like that altho i thought it would be when i read the synopsis.

so if you think you know the story because it involves a closed community living on an island with the main lead being an outsider, think again.

there are many crappy movie in the genre, this is not one of them.

as a bonus the psychiatrist is very easy on the eye ;)

In Ireland, the psychiatrist Jane Morton (Carice van Houten) is assigned to give a psychological assessment to the disturbed teenager Dorothy Mills (Jenn Murray) that tried to strangle a baby while babysitting him. After leaving the island ferry, an orange car with three teenagers causes an accident with Jane's car that falls in the sea and miraculously survives. She finds a hostile environment in the island with the unsettled dwellers that seems to be nervous with her presence. Jane seeks out Dorothy in the house of her Aunt Eileen MacMahon that is raising the girl and after a couple of interviews, she discovers that Dorothy has multiple personality disorder, impersonating the three year-old Mimi; and the teenagers Mary, Kurt and Duncan. When Dorothy embodies David, the young son of Jane that drowned in a tragic accident, the grieving psychiatrist also finds that the backward locals are fanatic religious believers and something dark lives in the island.

"Dorothy Mills" is a little gem of the supernatural genre to be discovered by movie lovers that follows the same style of the underrated "Haunted" and "The Innocents" with an engaging and ambiguous ghost story. The debut of Jenn Murray is spectacular and this young unknown actress is stunning performing different characters with her multiple personality disorder. It is impossible to guess her real age and in some moments she looks like an innocent girl and in the other an easy young woman. The point that I liked most is the ambiguity of the dramatic and mysterious plot, where a mourning psychiatrist (therefore with emotional problems) evaluates a disturbed girl in a dysfunctional society. Therefore the truth of the events in the island is never one hundred percent clear since it is narrated by a maladjusted character and consequently open to interpretation. My only remark is the underrated IMDb User Rating (6.0/10 with 1371 votes) since this film truly deserves a better rating. My vote is eight.

Title (Brazil): "Os Demônios de Dorothy Mills" ("The Demons of Dorothy Mills")

Overall not a terrible film, but not worthy of the high ratings some gave it. Carice van Houten acting was horrid to say the least and why did they cast her in the role with that Dutch accent is beyond me, the actress that acted Dorothy's role was way better. I gave the story a 6 but the overall score was dragged down by the flat as a Dutch pancake acting performance from Carice van Houten, and that's coming from me that was born in Holland.

5 out of 10