Daniel (Adam Jones) is a socially awkward guy as is, and the Covid lockdowns have pushed his various fears into overdrive - but have also convinced him to finally take action and make friends, especially of the female kind.  Unfortunately, he doesn't know how to even properly talk to women, so his attempts to pick one up in a supermarket parking lot only leads to embarrassment. But Daniel's not one who's easily deterred, so he makes some modifications to his SUV, then pretty much grabs a random young lady, Madison (Alexandrea Meyer), from the street, drags her into the back of his car, chains her up, and drives the car all out in the middle of nowhere to pretty much "tame" her where nobody can interfere - and yes, taming means that he rapes her as well. At first, this totally traumatizes Madison, but eventually she learns how to deal with the situation and get into her kidnapper's head - to the end that he eventually moves her into his (sound-proved) home and grants her more and more privileges - and soon she thinks she knows which buttons to push to eventually make good her escape. Unfortunately, awkward as Daniel might be, he's also highly intelligent and knows when he's played ...

Beautiful Friend is nothing if not a disturbing movie, basically it tells its entire story from a psychopath's point of view, and his constant (mostly inner) monologue paired with mostly (seemingly random) camerawork with a fly-on-the-wall feel makes one feel oddly complicit, and uncomfortably so. And convincing performances by both the leads, coupled with a unsettingly subtle directorial effort only help make this ... well, certainly not a film for everybody, and at times even a(n intentional) pain to watch, but definitely a worthwhile experience for those looking for challenging movies.

review © by Mike Haberfelner

 

Feeling lucky? Want to search any of my partnershops yourself for more, better results? (commissions earned)

The links below will take you just there!!!

Find Beautiful Friend at the amazons ...   amazon.com   amazon.co.uk   amazon.de Looking for imports? Find Beautiful Friend here ...   eThaiCD.com Your shop for all things Thai

Thanks for watching !!!