Folie meurtrière

mrc303 nailed it..

Olivia Wilde's amazing performance.. along with Nick and the rest.

The acting was superb.. writing OK.. and overall very well done.

Simple fact is the actor(s) did as was needed and then some.

A sadly under rated winner IMHO.

How on earth this is only a 4.9 is astounding. Maybe the "Napoleon" fans need to learn what real acting is.

Oh and Min lines etc rules... phooey (review editor can remove this line but pls let the superiors know that it's not an effective rule to prevent spam. etc etc)

Is it an epic masterpiece? No. Is it well and appropriately written? Yes. Is it well acted? Absolutely.

OK, some of the back-story is left a little lacking in flashbacks that are extremely short and for the most part lacking in development. But the present is well thought out, follows a natural character progression, and there aren't any unnecessary character trait flips to create artificial drama. The ending is appropriate for the progression of the story. Even the audio is perfectly developed.

Basically, this hits the mark on every mark except special effects (which would feel completely tacked on and unnecessary anyway). I don't get why there are so many poor reviews for something very solid!

Watch this one for the acting. We get to see some pretty mainstream actors playing crazy, and it is gripping to watch. Olivia Wilde gave a phenomenal performance. I enjoyed her in this more than anything else I have seen her in. Olivia really went to a vulnerable and broken place to play this role. The story was simple, but this movie wasn't really story driven. In contrast, the characters were deep, and the actor's performances carried this movie.

We don't really see the characters grow, or change, except for some subtle realizations at the end. What we do get is a slowly deepening glimpse into the minds of some some very confused people and the deeper we go, the more human they become to us. This movie is really trying to tell us that among the most damaged people in our society, while many are beyond redemption, others are just trying to find happiness, and to figure out what that is for them and if it is even possible given their flawed natures.

This movie was so awful i wish i didn't even have to give it a star. thank god i only waisted a dollar 25 or whatever and an hour or so of my life on this god awful movie. Don't see this!! it had noooo story line whatsoever. it never went anywhere. horrible, seriously. the distcription of it when you go to rent it from red box it seems like its gonna be another shutter island kinda scary but the whole description was miss leading and i couldn't be more disappointed. i can't believe I'm waisting my time on this thing!! that is all. and i never write reviews unless they are this bad. thanks for reading..hope you take my advice! xox

Allen Meneric (Nick Stahl) is committed to a psychiatric institution after killing the wrong man for raping his girlfriend. There he deal with violent patients (Dash Mihok and Pruitt Taylor Vince). Once he is allowed into the minimum security section, he meets a beautiful bipolar female inmate Mia (Olivia Wilde). The institution is loose with security, and Dr. Lofton (Shohreh Aghdashloo) in charge refuses to address. Inevitably things go wrong.

The story meanders quite a bit. It takes a few detours into the killing, his past while we wait for the action to start. The pace is rather slow and the action doesn't start till the end. Nick Stahl doesn't have enough emotional drama. If this was a character study, they needed to get him to overcome emotional hurdles.