Jack Ketchum's The girl next door
Year of release : 2007
Run time : 1h31min
Genre : Drama / Horror / Crime
The movie is based on the 1989 book of the same name (reading about what happened to that poor girl,I don't know which is worse,what happened to her in real life, or what they showed in the movie!) by Jack Ketchum, based on the 1965 murder of Sylvia Likens.
The movie opens with the narrator (the writer ) reminiscing on what real pain is,after resuscitating a man who passed out.
In the summer of 1958, he meets his teenage crush, Meg. She and her sister,who is disabled, stay with her aunt,after her parents died in a car crash,which left Meg with scars and her sister disabled.
He and other kids think she's living the life, as Ruth is 'one of the boys'.
Things aren't so great for Meg, as she tells him she didn't eat in 2 days, as Ruth calls her fat.
Soon, David (our narrator), witnesses Ruth verbally abusing Meg. After this, things escalate,as she's not afraid to beat her and abuse her in front of other kids, making her kids abuse Meg.
She's also beating the disabled little girl for things she didn't do.
Things escalate ,and they tie Meg in the basement,with her arms up,feet barely touching the ground,while neighborhood kids are coming to watch her being belittled, striped naked, tortured,and even r@ped!
This movie is very hard to watch, I honestly wanted to turn it off a few times, but didn't ,for I thought it was gonna stop,and she was gonna be rescued. Spoiler alert, she's never rescued.
I don't understand how could someone do this to someone else, and, by the way, get away with it, as most of them,got away with it -I'm talking about the real people this story was inspired from- only the two main abusers ended up in jail for a few years and then released on parole, for torturing and k!lling a girl! They should have been given the death penalty ,and all who paid to torture her, to never be released from jail!
The family didn't care that much either, and also, considering the girl just let all this happen to her, without running away, or telling anyone, when even her parents visited,it's like she had a death wish!
The neighbors who knew about the abuse,didn't care either.
Watch it at your on risk. This movie made me very angry.
The movie doesn't have a resolution, it's just abuse and torture for an hour and a half. It ends when the police comes,and doesn't tell us what happened to the abusers and the ones who watched,who are just as guilty!
What happened in reality was just as bad, just that the parents weren't dead, they worked at the carnival,had many kids,and left their daughters in the care of this woman who had 7 kids! The abuse started and continued whenever the parents didn't pay her on time! The girl was abused by the woman,her daughter Paula, one of her sons,Paula's boyfriend,and the boyfriend's friends. I think the blame is also on the victim,as when her parents visited, she never told them that this woman was torturing her (they actually visited once after the insane woman tortured her,and she didn't say anything to them) . The kids we see in the basement watching the torture, in real life were kids who paid this insane woman to torture this girl! And they all got away with it!
The acting was great from everyone involved.
The movie is for free on Plex, for free with ads on Freevee , for 30 days free on Amazon Prime, Amazon Prime Video with Ads, for 7 days free on Apple+, and for rent / sale on Amazon Prime, Apple, Fandango at Home.
Rating : ?! , I would give it a Worth a watch !,for the acting is great,but it's hard to watch!