Steve is a man who has it all, a successful career, wonderful children, beautiful home and a loving wife. However, returning to his home after work on his birthday, he finds his house deserted and darkened with almost all the lightbulbs missing, all easy access outside cut off and a videotape waiting for him. Playing that tape, he watches a bizarre and grueling recording in which his wife explains her grievance with him, her reasons for disappearing with the children and her revenge for how he treated her in a way he would never forget.
Buday is coolly persuasive in the seesaw role of an unbalanced housewife who jerks from despair to anger.
– Stephen Cole,
Globe and Mail,
28 May 2004
fresh:
It's a movie that will leave few men unrattled and many women vicariously satisfied.
– Geoff Pevere,
Toronto Star,
28 May 2004
rotten:
De Heer, who also wrote the script, would have us believe that a wife who's tired of her oblivious bloke of a husband could suddenly become conniving and cruel, coolly defending her actions with twisted logic that's sold as feminism.
– John McMurtrie,
San Francisco Chronicle,
14 Jan 2005
fresh:
De Heer offers a wicked twist on household secrets and lies.
– Michael Booth,
Denver Post,
28 Jan 2005
rotten:
It's a contrived -- though carefully crafted -- bit of movie gamesmanship that sometimes seems like a claustrophobic stunt.