Director: Chase Dudley, Samantha Dudley, David Siragusa
Year: 2024
Country: USA
Alternate Titles: A Good Girls’ Guide to Murder
Genre: Suspense/Thriller
Plot:
Living in a tragic family life, a woman tries to deal with the abusive situations surrounding her parents, each having their own separate issues against each other that leave her feeling abandoned and neglected. As time goes on and the household becomes even more toxic, it causes her to lash out at others leading to the realization that she can get away with murder and setting her off on a killing spree to get revenge on her parents for how they’ve treated her.
Review:
This was a massively underwhelming effort. Among its main problems is the way everything is just so disconnected and scattershot with the way it approaches the family dynamic. As it’s supposed to be a continuous build-up of events over time leading to the snap and eventual realization of everything coming together to explain how it all leads to the killing spree, instead we’re just dropped into the family dynamic with no build-up, no context, and little reason to care as a result. All we get is an angsty daughter snapping at everyone around her for the most indiscriminate means, a well-meaning mother who instead acts like a pushover due to the standoffish nature she portrays trying to keep the peace, and a father with an obviously secretive lustful desire to the daughter that strains the relationship with his wife. This works fine at establishing the motive later on as we get the backstory explaining everything about why she’s distrustful of everyone and why she snaps the way she does, but it comes after the point we’ve lost interest in that due to the way we get dropped into a situation with unlikable people.
That leads to the other big problem where it’s just dragged out way too long for its own good with incidental elements that don’t feel needed or necessary to the story. The endless therapy sessions that crop up without doing much of anything important in them, the mind-numbing hangouts with the daughter’s best friend that don’t really amount to much of anything about her, and the focus on trying to establish how the parents’ needs are the main focus is on them rather than the daughter which is arguably far more important and intriguing. This causes the film to be far longer than it should be with the rampage coming across so late into the movie it’s quite easy to forget what type of film it really is. As well as the other features involving the quest to seduce the handyman or trying to lean into his obsessive desires about his daughter drag this one out past the point of mattering about its positives.
That doesn’t distinguish from the fact that those positives are quite enjoyable. The more we learn about the true nature of what’s going on with her damaged past serving as a fine prelude for the mind games she plays with everyone as what happened to her is a genuinely traumatic and disturbing incident that explains the behavior displayed completely. That she goes through such a convoluted and unhinged game makes all the more sense because of how she came to be from these incidents that lead to a scheme of a manipulative figure looking to strike back at those around her which includes the occasional murder attempt which are quite gruesome and bloody when they strike out of nowhere. Hence, the shock of it all comes together quite nicely. The frenzied and chaotic finale where the broken and shattered remains of what’s happened to the both of them leaves this with some fun stalking and confrontations in play while also bringing about a logical way to wrap everything together so that the trauma of everything is handled rather well so it has some positive points about it. Overall, these manage to provide some enjoyable factors.
Overview: */5
A far more flawed effort than anything even with some enjoyable aspects sprinkled throughout here, there’s not much to like here which is the overwhelming feeling from this one leaving it quite underwhelming. Give it a shot if you don’t mind the issues present, are intrigued by the style of filmmaking overall, or are fans of the creative crew while most others out there might want to heed extreme caution if not outright avoid it.
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