The Girl Who Got Away

Without giving much away - this is a brilliant movie for what it is. Was pleasantly surprised that what i thought was happening was close but the twists left me guessing until the very end. A few jump scares but builds a good storyline and the thriller/psychological terror is more the backburn to that. Strong cast performances.

One day in 1998 in the town of Mesena, New York the serial killer Elizabeth Caulfield is arrested. This brings to an end ten years where five young girls were kidnapped. Only one survived; Christina Bowden. Twenty years later and Christina is still living in Mesena where she works as a teacher and is contemplating adopting a troubled teenage girl. Then one day Elizabeth Caulfield escapes from custody. Christina is warned by police officer Jamie Nwosu but refuses to leave town; soon people close to her start turning up dead... it looks as if Caulfield is after the girl who got away. Or is there more to it than that?

This film got off to a solid start and progresses well enough. In many ways it goes as expected; that is to say there are plenty of twists, some better than others. Most of the murders appear off screen but those that are shown are reasonably but not excessively gory. The Upstate New York setting was good although much of the action takes place indoors. The acting is solid enough, nothing to trouble the awards panels but certainly not poor, at least not in the main roles. At a little under two hours it is a bit too long; it could have done with trilling it down by ten to twenty minutes. Overall I'd not say this was a must watch but it is okay if you enjoy the genre.

No pun intended - the movie starts off with us in the woods ... and it has a few shockers at hand. We see someone running away ... and while the father is trying to avoid to actually do something ... he decides to "help" - whatever that would mean for him and his kid.

From the start we know there is more to the movie and the characters than meets the eye. And of course another inciting incident will help the movie to roll along many years after the initial beginning of it. Relationships get explored, twists are being thrown at you .. and there is a bit of fun to be had. Though it mostly is suspense to say the least. Well done, especially considering the budget that the movie has.

This is an odd film with long scenes of dialogue that go on too long and other scenes with sudden fits of explosive violence. It reminded me a lot of 1982's ALONE IN THE DARK in that manner. TGWGA is not terrible, definitely not incompetent. The script and the editing needed to be more focused and tightened. As an editor of 15+ years, I saw many pauses that could have been pulled up and bits of repetitive dialogue that could have been trimmed to cut a good 10 minutes out of this film without losing a single scene, although I would have jettisoned the one truly bad scene with the social worker at Christina's home late in the movie. It's not well acted and is unintentionally funny. At 116 minutes, many will find this movie to be plodding, not thrilling.

I wish this thriller had a little less talk and a little more thrill to it. I wish the backstory of the serial killer was fleshed out a bit more and that the movie had less characters/subplots. I hope the makers of this film get a chance to make another movie and hone their skills because there's definitely talent behind the camera.

I was really into this movie and it seemed to be a good thriller but with all the twists and turns unexplained instead of satisfaction I was left confused ultimately.