ExTerminators

While I went into this movie not expecting much because of how low its ratings generally are online, I'm happy to say that I came out of it having been blown away. From the suspense it creates in its very first scene to the twist it reveals in a sexy and well-shot scene near its end, this dark comedy succeeded in keeping me captivated and laughing for most of its running time. Additionally, it left me with some serious questions and lessons about some serious issues like domestic violence and women's solidarity in the end.

Perhaps what is most positive about the movie is the chemistry between its three main cast members - Heather Graham (as Alex), Jennifer Coolidge (as Stella), and Amber Heard (as Nikki). The three do an excellent job portraying three women who though they could not be any more different in their personalities, are nevertheless united in the their having gone through awful experiences with men and in having ended up on the wrong side of the law for having reacted in violent ways to the experiences. And it's perhaps because of the chemistry between these three women that the movie succeeds in being the entertaining comedy that it is.

Although the three women all gave stellar performances, I have to especially single out Amber Heard for her role as Nikki. I was at first skeptical that Heard would be able to play Nikki well because this was the first time in her career that she was playing a major comedic role. However, she managed to do away with this skepticism in me within the first 15 minutes of the film and she in the end succeeded in entertainingly merging, within Nikki's character, the comedic aspects of the movie with its darker aspects. This attests to Heard's versatility as an actress by that time because she'd already managed to convincingly play characters in horror (All the Boys Love Mandy Lane), thriller (Criminal Minds), drama (Hidden Palms), action (Never Back Down), teen (Remember the Daze), and now comedic roles in the movies she'd done. It's also worth noting here that ever since her performance in North Country (2005), this was more or less the first time that Heard took part in a movie with feminist themes and that had a strong leading female presence. And it was the second time that she was shooting in her hometown (Austin, Texas, USA) in her career - the first time having been her shooting All the Boys Love Mandy Lane in 2006.

Given Heard's great performance and her centrality in the movie's plot, one therefore wonders why she was excluded in the main poster for the movie. Whatever the reason was, her exclusion would have been a massive marketing mistake and it would also have been somewhat out-of-place since her character (Nikki) is more of an "exterminator" in the movie than even Heather Graham's character (Alex).

Besides matters relating to the performances, I found the movie's writing to be impressive in its uniqueness and creativity. Indeed, it is rare to see a movie that has women killing men as part of its major plot that is not overly sexualized and that presents the killings through a woman's gaze rather than through the "male gaze." This movie is, fortunately, exactly such a movie and so it would not be surprising know that it was an independent filmmaker woman (Suzanne Weinert) that wrote it. Contrary to most "woman kills men" movies - which have women's motives for killing men inevitably tied to sex and men's sexual fantasies in one way or another (e.g. Rape, lust, affair gone wrong etc) - Weinert centers the motives for Alex, Stela, and Nikki's killings of men on women's needs, particularly the need for women to free themselves from abusive relationships with the male victims. This, in my opinion, explains why many critics - most of them men - would have related poorly to the movie and thus panned it. And yet it is a strength of the movie rather than its weakness. Consequently, I believe that the movie is highly and unfairly underrated by an audience that is too used to centering women's cinematic violence against men on men's sexual needs to appreciate a movie that centers such violence on women's needs.

Another plus for the movie is that, despite some reviewers here saying otherwise, it actually is a great comedy. Most of the jokes in the movie are well-written and equally well-presented and performed and so I have little doubt that anyone with any sense of humor would be laughing throughout most of the movie.

Also of positive note are the movie's primary messages. One of them is that, often, women in abusive relationships with men are unfairly punished and pathologized for reacting violently to the abuse. Indeed, this is context in which Alex, Stella, and Nikki meet. The other key message is that women should learn to work together and promote other women because women's solidarity goes a long way towards improving women's lives and towards helping them escape abusive relationships. This message may be lost to many by the radical (read: murderous) way through which the three main characters in the movie choose to "solve" their problems but once one realizes that their "solution" is, among other things, merely an instrument for emphasizing how strong the bond between women needs to be, this message will not be lost to them.

All those said, I would criticize the movie's poor racial representation even as I would praise its positive gender and socio-economic representations. Every other aspect of the movie besides these - editing, cinematography, costumes, production design etc - is just so-so, being neither distinguishable nor problematic.

I rated this movie a 10 for all its strengths as discussed and despite its racial underrepresentation (because I did not deem this underrepresentation to take much away from its positives). I recommend the movie strongly to all looking for a light and fun dark comedy with which to pass time while also picking up some life lessons along the way. I especially recommend it to women but also to men who are unafraid of seeing the cinematic dark side to women through women's perspectives rather than men's. Fans of Amber Heard would also really want to watch this movie because she gives one of her best comedic performances in it.