The Girl Who Got Away

We are introduced to Christina, the only survivor of a house of horrors. Although there is gore, this is really not a horror movie. Elizabeth Caulfield kidnapped children, each one a year after the previous one, and killed all but Christina. Christina is making a new life for herself as a teacher, when Elizabeth Caulfield escapes during a traffic accident while being transferred. Police are certain she will track down Christina, but Christina won't run, saying "she took everything from me once. I can't let that happen again." It is a small town, and one officer, Jamie, winds up trying to protect her. Jamie perhaps plays the best role of any of them, and he starts to realize that not everything adds up, and goes over the case. He finds there are lots of secrets. As the search for Elizabeth continues, the body count in that small town starts to climb, almost anyone who is connected with Christina. While there is a simmering pot at the start, it slowly starts to raise to a boil. And those are some of the problems with the film. Whether it is the script, the editing or characters, it gets confusing near the end. It is however, worth staying to the end.

No pun intended - the movie starts off with us in the woods ... and it has a few shockers at hand. We see someone running away ... and while the father is trying to avoid to actually do something ... he decides to "help" - whatever that would mean for him and his kid.

From the start we know there is more to the movie and the characters than meets the eye. And of course another inciting incident will help the movie to roll along many years after the initial beginning of it. Relationships get explored, twists are being thrown at you .. and there is a bit of fun to be had. Though it mostly is suspense to say the least. Well done, especially considering the budget that the movie has.

This is an odd film with long scenes of dialogue that go on too long and other scenes with sudden fits of explosive violence. It reminded me a lot of 1982's ALONE IN THE DARK in that manner. TGWGA is not terrible, definitely not incompetent. The script and the editing needed to be more focused and tightened. As an editor of 15+ years, I saw many pauses that could have been pulled up and bits of repetitive dialogue that could have been trimmed to cut a good 10 minutes out of this film without losing a single scene, although I would have jettisoned the one truly bad scene with the social worker at Christina's home late in the movie. It's not well acted and is unintentionally funny. At 116 minutes, many will find this movie to be plodding, not thrilling.

I wish this thriller had a little less talk and a little more thrill to it. I wish the backstory of the serial killer was fleshed out a bit more and that the movie had less characters/subplots. I hope the makers of this film get a chance to make another movie and hone their skills because there's definitely talent behind the camera.

I felt like there were a lot of spaces i had to assume and fill in the blanks but not necessarily in a bad or tiring way. I got confused but then would think it was going one way and then confusion again. It was worth the watch but for the length of the movie i would expect them to be able to add in more details or explain things better because there does seem to be an issue with getting the storyline across without any plot holes/doing it smoothly. The acting was also... questionable at parts?? Overall i wouldn't watch it again but i'd definitely recommend it to other people if they want a good mystery/horror movie.

Without giving much away - this is a brilliant movie for what it is. Was pleasantly surprised that what i thought was happening was close but the twists left me guessing until the very end. A few jump scares but builds a good storyline and the thriller/psychological terror is more the backburn to that. Strong cast performances.