Directed by : Sarah Polley

How would you feel if in your entire life it never mattered what you thought ? 

Rooney Mara, Claire Foy, Jessie Buckley, Judith Ivey and others in a still from 'Women Talking'

Spoilers ahead... 


Adaptation of Miriam Toews novel based on a true story that revolves around a religious isolated Mennonite community. It's a community where all generations of women ranging from preteen to elders (even 60+) have gone through various sorts of abuses - assaults, beating, domestic violence, rape, and incest. They decide enough is enough, and cast votes where the 3 options are - 'Do Nothing', 'Stay' & 'Fight, and Leave.' There's a tie between the latter two, and as a result two families decide to have a debate based conversation on both the options. August (Ben Whishaw) arrives at the hayloft of the village to help in supervising the meeting where he takes the minutes (notes) of all the women involved. He's one of the better guys in the community whom they don't fear at all.  One by one, the pros and cons are noted down for both 'Stay' and 'Fight, and Leave'. 

The two families comprise of, Agata (Judith Ivey) with her daughters, Ona (Rooney Mara) and Salome (Claire Foy) ; Greta (Sheila McCarthy) with her daughters, Mariche (Jessie Buckley) and Mejal (Michelle Mcleod). They also include teenage daughters who mostly are in narrative to provide little humor while the heavy debate is on. At one point they giggle and comment 'This is so so boring', and that may have been director pointing out towards a section of audience feeling the same for movie. Unfortunately, I felt the same. 

True to its title, the entire movie has women talking. In some of the scenes when August tries to talk more, he is shut off being told you are here to listen only, not give your personal opinions. While I certainly have no issues with such dialogue heavy narrative, what disappoints is the manner in which the debate happens. Many places, it felt staged and not real, and I didn't really like how they try to break the tension with unwanted cuts to children or the elders themselves doing comedy like the scene where one character says 'looks like I am dying' when its just her spectacles getting little dusty.  

There's this note at start 'What follows is an act of female imagination', and it makes me wonder if the conclusion of the debate and the actions they take didn't happen in real and was just a fictional tale. It was hard to believe so many women going out without their men who have been treating them badly all the while, don't come to notice or stop them. Also, how a transgender survived in such an environment was hard to imagine.

The initial part of the movie was engaging, to see a place where only boys study, some flashes of what some women have gone through and the interesting way of voting. Even during the debate few dialogues land very well, specially the forgiveness one, where forgiving someone can also mean giving them permission to do the bad thing again. I also like how Ona in a private talk with August painfully question him 'why love has to be violent.' The use of some of the tracks is also good, much better way to give small break to the ongoing debate. 

Women Talking just didn't work for me at all.. most of the debate either came across as pretentious or preaching instead of an authentic constructive debate. Definately a well intentioned movie with a great looking cast.. but the execution lets it terribly down. 

My Rating : 4/10