Perfect Strangers

This movie has been hanging out in the New Release section of blockbuster stores since the day it arrived on DVD around a year ago. That's because people keep re-renting it (no, not me...I bought my own copy). My praise will not do this movie justice. I have not seen Sam Neill act more convincingly in a movie. He got that mysterious stranger role down perfectly. Rachel Blake was extraordinary. You just couldn't take your eyes off either one of them (regardless of the condition they were in). This is a beautiful movie, with stunning actors, breathtaking scenery, and haunting music. While watching the movie, you'll find yourself asking yourself "what would I do?". You'll also say to yourself "I must get that soundtrack!" I highly recommend it! @-->--> Kris

I disagree with the previous comment. The movie possesses enough drama and suspense to keep the viewers interested until the very end. This is the story of two people who could have been happy together under different circumstances. It's also the story of what happens when people make the wrong choice. The movie asks the question what makes a certain choice the wrong one and points out that every choice could be both right and wrong. The music is well chosen, and the combination between Puccini's opera "Madam Butterfly" and a number of contemporary ballads enhances the atmosphere. The ending is unexpected and leaves the viewer surprised and delighted at the same time.

It starts like a conventional girl-goes-home-with-the-wrong-man-horror. After a while it is almost relation comedy and psycho drama and relation comedy again.

You miss the traditional agenda here. This is perhaps a form experiment, mixing genres. But the mix is not done in a clever way. You expect something to happen, a real climax, but it never comes and you are slowly getting uninterested.

This kind of genre mixing can be exciting, but the actors here are not capable of fulfilling the director's intentions. A failure and not a very good one.

Saw Perfect Strangers at the Vancouver Film Fest, September 30, 2003. Well made, and thouroughly engaging movie that suprises at many turns. The simple story of a working class woman who goes home from a bar with an interesting stranger becomes first a story of kidnapping but then moves to a more complex story of love, obsession, and fear.

As with many foreign films, Pefect Strangers is not afraid to mix fantasy with reality. And, it helps to have excellent direction, music, and above all acting by the two leads.

I recommend this film if you get a chance to see it, or eventually rent it.

I rented this while I was staying in NZ and sat down prepared for a love story that turns into something like Fatal Attraction or something. Not at all. I appreciate the plot twists and enjoyed the extreme weirdness. Not horrible but not fantastic either ( in my opinion.

All in all I think the acting was pretty believable, but there are some plot holes (pretty gaping ones actually). However the story is pretty consistent with details from the beginning being carried over through the end.

I will look for movies with the lead actress and this director again in the future.

Enjoyable for those with twisted minds.