WOMAN, THE

The Woman is a sequel to Offspring (previously reviewed) and it carries on almost directly after the previous film. Pollyanna McIntosh reprises her role of 'The Woman' and we find her wounded and alone following the finale of Offspring. An abusive and dominating husband stumbles upon her while hunting and captures her. He constructs a holding pen for her in his basement and forces his wife & children to help civilise her. This is a hugely superior film to Offspring thanks to the masterful direction of Lucky McKee. He's a fantastic director who handles dark & twisted effortlessly. Unlike the previous movie, The Woman explores a whole range of themes from incest to women's liberation and domestic abuse. While the cannibal woman's capture and abuse is at the centre of this story, the film's attention is tightly focused on the family's own captivity by a violent and sadistic father. Its heavy stuff and as expected, the camera doesn't flinch from the violence nor is anything off limits. The violence depicted is depraved but absolutely necessary, unlike the previous film which showed an over abundance of gore just for the sake of it. From my own video store experience its strange that few people are aware that this is a sequel at all and where I watched them chronologically I'm curious to know how people perceived it having not seen Offspring? Without the woman's back story and lead-up to these events do people feel more sympathetically for her? I imagine it would be a totally different movie when seen on it's own. I also read recently that the first novel (Offseason) which takes place before Offspring is heading into production to act as a prequel and round off the trilogy. I'm looking forward to it and wonder which approach they will take with it? Will it be a straight forward horror like Osffspring or will it be a deeper psychological affair like The Woman? We'll see.

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