Fridae

Lesbian viewers should certainly catch this solid women's drama before they see anything else this week. Despite the gray and dull trailers you may have seen of the movie, Dead Girl is actually an impressive achievement by Karen Moncrieff and her excellent cast of actresses, which include Toni Collette (The Sixth Sense), Marcia Gay Harden (Pollack), and Brittany Murphy (Girl, Interrupted).

Indeed, it has the most impressive assembly of female actresses since The Hours.

Dead Girl is an omnibus of short films that revolve around a dead girl. In the opening sequence, a lonely woman (Toni Collette) finds the body of the girl, which becomes the catalyst for her leaving home and her abusive mother (Piper Laurie). In second, a forensics student (the lovely Rose Byrne) suspects that the corpse may be her runaway sister. In the third, a wife (Mary Beth Hurt) comes to realise that maybe her husband had committed the crime. In the fourth, a mother (Marcia Gay Harden) searches for her daughter and discovers that she may have been murdered. And in the final sequence, the film traces the day and night before the death of the girl (Brittany Murphy).

The film is remarkable in so many ways. Even though it starts off somewhat slowly and shakily, it gradually gathers steam and become a fully intense and heartbreaking experience. It gets its strength mostly from the fiercely passionate performances by its actresses, with some actresses displaying untold depth not seen in most of their other roles.

We're talking about Mary Beth Hurt who is extraordinary as a trailer park woman, and Brittany Murphy who proves why she is so much more talented than her fluffy teen flicks (Just Married, Uptown Girls) give her a chance to be. Their stand-out performance are well-worth the price of the ticket.

Not to be missed.