A MAD, BLACK PSYCHO-DRAMA

Australian Financial Review
October 4th 2003.

“Set largely on an island off the romantic West Coast of the South island of new Zealand, Perfect Strangers starts out as formulaic as Fatal Attraction – then turns into a psychological study of survival before leaving you at the end thinking you’ve been watching a fable.

It’s a difficult film to categorise although the plot is quite straightforward. It suggests young women shouldn’t go off with strangers they meet in pubs – especially when drunk…..”

“……..Written and directed by Gaylene Preston this two hander is assembled with surprising sureness. The performances by Neill and Blake are complex and involving as Melanie enters a bizarre version of the Stockholme Syndrome with a frozen cadaver.

Had the film been a little tighter, and the action more compressed, it would have been the best Hitchcockian film since Hitchcock.
As it is, it’s still pretty good.”