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[She's Crushed]
Plot:Love can be painful. Very painful. The intriguing-on-the-outside, twisted-and-tortured-on-the-inside Tara sets her sights on the unassuming guy-next-door Ray. Their innocent flirting turns into a regretful one night stand which he hopes to put behind him. Tara has different plans for their relationship. It becomes horrifically apparent that she refuses to be cast aside and is willing to go to sick extremes to keep her man as people in Ray's life are met with torturous ends. Amidst this violently twisted love story unfolds a profound social commentary on love and the effects of violence.
Cast:Natalie Dickinson,
Henrik Norlen,
Robert Paschall Jr.,
Caitlin Wehrle,
Keith Malley,
Hunter Carson.
My Thoughts:Kooky but misses the mark.
Review:"She's Crushed" is the story of a man who makes the soon-to-be fatal, mistake of having a torrid one-night-stand with a woman who lives right next door to him. This due to him having problems in his own relationship with the mother of his son. Like most guys, he pretty much moves on from the stand, and continues on with his life. But not so fast...the woman, Tara...isn't about to let Ray just forget about her that easily. And she's willing to go to any...ANY...lengths to make sure he never, forgets about her again.
This movie can be summed up as real-life horror. We do live in a day and age where people suffer serious consequences after cheating or having affairs. Tiger Woods comes to mind, as a most recent example. But this movie explores the consequences from the aspect of the woman who Ray bedded, and then quickly dumped. Tara though isn't innocent. She initiates the contact by flirting with Ray. But Ray, who could've resisted her advances (especially since she's not that good looking), decides to be a dog anyways, and go for it.
That's when she injects herself into his life, calling him, stalking him, threatening to do harm to his wife and child, and evne showing up at his job. Something tells me the maker of this movie saw the 2009 movie "Obsessed" with Ali Larter and Beyonce, as there's a scene in this movie where Ray and Tara are inside a car, and some pretty torrid stuff happens. And this movie plays out a lot like "Obsessed" does, with the other woman escalating her tactics to snag the guy she wants.
But what makes this a horror film is when Tara starts slahing through and killing random people who are tied to Ray, and in some cases aren't, just to further her ambitions and plans to get him. Plans which soon turn from object of affection, to target of destruction. "She's Crushed" despite all of these intersecting issues, is not very entertaining. Mostly because of it's "been-there-done-that" storyline, and also it's lack of good performances and extremely low budget.
The movie just fails to deliver in many areas where it could've really made an impact, and Natalie Dickinson as Tara is often over-the-top in her performance. Granted, she does some good things in her role as well, but for the most part, it's just too much. The character of Ray also is a real asshole. And it's hard to really sympathize with the guy in the least. Sure, you can sympathize with his spouse and his child who have been thrust into the sights of this psycho femme due to Ray's inability to keep it in his pants, but can you even feel a slight bit of pity for Ray as he's being targeted and harassed more and more throughout the film?
No not really. However, the finale does manage to force you to sprout up some roots of sympathy here and there for Ray, as it's a very gory, bizarre, twisted, and disturbingly sad way that the movies ends. So in the end, as much as you hate Ray for bringing this problem on himself and his family, you just can't help but feel for him a bit when the pic reaches it's thrilling conclusion. It's just too bad that what the finale 10 minutes deliver, the rest of the movie fails to do so.
Positives:Great finish, and Tara is a very disturbing character.
Negatives:The characters lack charisma or on-screen presence early on, it's hard to relate to or like any of them. Dickinson most of the time is over the top as Tara, and the script overall lacked any really powerful moments beyond the finale 10 minutes.
Overall:Two out of four stars.
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