DarknessVisible20

There is SO much to unpack in this movie, and it's hard to capture it all in a single review, but I will try to lay out my thoughts as succinctly as possible about what I feel is a brilliant and important movie.

A couple of women meet some well-to-do men at a ritzy event, and are then invited to join them on a luxurious trip to a private island. When they arrive, they join a larger group of people, and in the days that follow, everyone has a seemingly amazing time, filled with free-spirited fun, luxury, and relaxation.

However, as multiple days come and go, it becomes apparent to at least one of the women that something is definitely... off. After she expresses her concerns to her good friend, she disappears, and no one except her friend seems to have any recollection she was even there. Things get slowly but surely more disturbing from there.

I don't want to give away any spoilers about the plot, because I feel it's important to truly experience this movie without knowing what you're going into, but I do want to discuss my impressions of the overall themes of this movie.

At its core, this movie is about the systematic abuses against women in society, largely, but not entirely, in the form of sexual abuse. The sexual and physical abuse component is strong and disturbing, but it goes well beyond that, and takes on other pervasive patterns of systematic abuse. It addresses psychological abuse and gaslighting, as well as the abhorrent societal conditioning of turning women against each other, which is something that desperately needs to be called out and stopped. At one point, one of the characters points out that women are conditioned to compete against each other in order to distract them from the real threats they face, and this is something I have been screaming from the rooftops for many years. If women united instead of competing and undermining each other, there would be no limit to their collective power. Which is exactly what the misogynists fear, and therefore they work hard to keep us at each other's throats.

In the movie, when the women collectively began to realize the horrific abuses inflicted upon them, they take their power back in an unflinching way.

There is so much awesome nuance in this movie, which, especially if you're a woman, will not go over your head.

Props to Channing Tatum, who usually plays the good guy, for taking on the role of such an unsavory villain. That takes courage, and he played his character brilliantly.

I recommend this movie highly, and definitely recommend seeing it more than once.

P. S. If you're a man that's in any way threatened by what this movie conveys, you are absolutely part of the problem.

As someone who's lived in California for over 30 years, I saw this case play out pretty close to home. It was another media-fueled circus. Although I'm obviously glad that justice was ultimately served, I find it bizarre that this particular case garnered SO much attention, when women go missing and are killed all over this state and country every single day, and are lucky if the authorities take any action, let alone the kind of media attention that this case garnered. Imagine if this had been a black homeless pregnant woman who the same thing happened to; someone with no money, no family, no connnections; you would have never heard about it. It's sad how prejudicial the 'justice' system is in this country, and how the media makes a circus out of tragedies, and manipulates public opinion. This was a decent docuseries, pretty typical of what Netflix produces, but it should make people think about the incredible disparities in the justice victims get in this country.

An incredibly important and horrifying expose of the 'MAID' program in Canada, which made state-sponsored euthanasia widely available to Canadians. As predicted by those that tried to sound the alarm about these euthanasia programs (and not just in Canada), assisted death is being pushed on not only the terminally ill, but people with completely treatable conditions, all in an effort to cut costs, and let's be honest, reduce the population. This documentary is thorough and excellent. Individuals are interviewed who were encouraged by the state-sponsored 'MAID' program to accept execution for conditions such as PTSD, and needing a wheelchair ramp installed in one's home. This is a horrifying cautionary tale of what's truly behind the 'compassionate' medically-assisted suicide movement. It's absolutely diabolical what the Canadian government is doing. Please watch this important documentary.