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Movies.ie Critic Review
MARTHA MARCY MAY MARLENE (USA/16/102mins)
Directed by Drake Doremus. Starring Elizabeth Olsen, John Hawke, Sarah Paulson, Hugh Dancy, Brady Corbet, Christopher Abbot.
THE PLOT: Arriving on the doorstep of her older sister Lucy (Paulson) and the latter’s husband, Ted (Dancy), Martha (Olsen) has been AWOL for two years. In flashback, we see Martha joined a cult, living on a remote farm and being sweetly brainwashed by the guitar-playing, dungaree-wearing leader Patrick (Hawkes). But this is no Kamp Krusty, despite the crappy conditions; as with so many cults, sex and violence is just below all the happy-clappy, and it has left Martha a highly distrustful person. One who is incapable of revealing to her sister and her brother-in-law what she has been through. As Martha’s paranoia builds, she starts noticing strangers hanging around her sister’s lakeside holiday home. And so, naturally, she’s goes a little Greystoke on them…
THE VERDICT: A title like Martha Marcy May Marlene has its own built-in hall of mirrors, reflecting the schizophrenia and paranoia that Olsen’s cult escapee is going through. The purpose of most cults, of course, is to take damaged people and then break them. Completely. And when it comes to hippie communes, it’s not all about the free love; it’s all about the free sex. Olsen – who looks like Maggie Gyllenhaal on a healthy diet – gives it her all in the title role, and this bleak film – a big hit at Sundance last year – has meant her future certainly looks bright. A dark, twisted film, it gradually got under my skin, like a bad itch. Then again, maybe that was the intention. RATING: 3
Review by Paul Byrne