Jack Ketchum's The Girl Next Door can be described as a very bad car accident: you want to look away, but you just can't seem to keep your eyes off of it. Unrelenting, horrific, violent, disturbing, brutal, upsetting, heartbreaking, and intriguing are just some of the adjectives I can use to describe this film. It's based on Jack's novel by the same name. It's also based loosely on the story of the Sylvia Likens; a kind of fictionalized version of it(for the real events, watch An American Crime). The Girl Next Door is about a young girl named Meg who has a crippled sister named Jenny. Their parents die and they're shipped off to live with "Aunt" Ruth. The boy who lives next door is friends with Ruth's three sons. At first, everything seems perfect and everyone gets along. However, Ruth decides she needs to teach Meg a lesson on how it is to be a woman in the 1960's. She tells Meg that she's a slut and a whore and is only good for one thing. When Meg attempts to rebel against her "lesson," the abuse begins. As the movie progresses, the abuse becomes full-blown torture and even the neighborhood children get involved. Some of the scenes depicted are awful and hard to watch, but like I said before, you can't turn away. This movie horrified and fascinated me at the same time and I almost felt dirty and ashamed for liking it. The ending, of course, made me bawl, and the police officer(s) pissed me off so bad that I wanted them to suffer along with Ruth and her asshole children. If you have a weak constituton or can't handle watching fictionalized child abuse, I'd advise you not to watch this. Just typing this now and thinking about the movie makes me want to cry again, that's how heartbreaking it was. It did leave a lasting impression, though, and is probably one of Jack's best films/novels to date(besides Red, of course). See this one if you think you can handle it. Acting is superb, direction is superb, and writing is superb. You have been warned.
Happy Nightmares, my loves.
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