Women Talking

2022
PG-13
1h 44m

IMDb RATING

6.9/10

44K

YOUR RATING

POPULARITY

Play trailer2:26

Period Drama Psychological Drama Drama

Do nothing, stay and fight, or leave. In 2010, the women of an isolated religious community grapple with reconciling a brutal reality with their faith.Do nothing, stay and fight, or leave. In 2010, the women of an isolated religious community grapple with reconciling a brutal reality with their faith.Do nothing, stay and fight, or leave. In 2010, the women of an isolated religious community grapple with reconciling a brutal reality with their faith.

See production info at IMDbPro

IMDb RATING

6.9/10

44K

YOUR RATING

POPULARITY

4,895

433

See production info at IMDbPro

Won 1 Oscar
- 65 wins & 163 nominations total

Trivia
The movie is based on Miriam Toews's 2018 novel of the same name, which was based on a true story of rapes in an insular, ultraconservative Mennonite community in Bolivia. From 2005 to 2009, nine men in the remote Manitoba Colony, using livestock tranquilizers, drugged female victims ranging in age from three to 60 and violently raped them at night. When the girls and women awoke bruised and covered in blood, the men of the colony dismissed their reports as delusions (even when they became pregnant from the assaults) or punishments from God or by demons for their sins. According to a May 2019 BBC article by Linda Pressly, when the assailants were finally caught, they were arrested by Bolivian authorities. One fled from justice, but the other eight were tried and convicted. Seven were sentenced to 25 years in prison for repeated, multiple rapes; an eighth was convicted for providing the drug, then released. According to a 2013 Vice article by Jean Friedman-Rudovsky, some men and boys in the colony had also been raped, and the druggings and rapes continued after the arrests.

Goofs
Nettie identifies as a man name "Melvin". The Mennonite do not allow members to identify as anything other than their biological sex and gender. In real life, Nettie would have been excommunicated. There are over one hundred different Anabaptist (Amish, Brethren, Hutterite, Mennonite) church groups, counting more than 6,000 congregations, all holding to slightly different traditions and their own interpretations of the Bible. The movie never identified the Anabaptist group of the colony.

Quotes
Autje: [narrating] We didn't talk about our bodies. So when something like this happened there was no language for it. And without language for it, there was a gaping silence. And in that gaping silence was the real horror.

Connections
Featured in The Graham Norton Show: Claire Foy/Sarah Michelle Gellar/M. Night Shyamalan/Rob Beckett/Sam Smith (2023)

Soundtracks
Daydream Believer
Written by John Stewart
Performed by The Monkees
Courtesy of Rhino Entertainment Company
By arrangement with Warner Music Group Film & TV Licensing

User reviews208

Review

Featured review

7/10

A Harrowing film about rape culture in Cult that was better to me

This movie was about a woman sleeping alone in bed who wakes to find bruises and wounds on her hips and upper inner thighs-injuries sustained from rape. Women Talking was based on a novel at the same name. It was about The Bolivian Mennonite gas-facilitated rapes refers to mass serial rapes by a group of men over at least four years in the Bolivian Mennonite settlement of Manitoba Colony. At least nine male members of the colony sprayed a veterinary sedative through window screens to render whole households unconscious. They then entered homes and raped the residents, particularly women and girls (but also small children). The minimum number of known victims stands at 151. Many victims were raped on multiple occasions. The youngest victim was three years old, the oldest was 65. Multiple victims were pregnant and one delivered an extremely premature baby after going into labor following a rape. There are believed to have been both adult and child male victims as well, but none were publicly identified. The perpetrators were in some cases blood relatives of the victims, the crimes thus including incestuous abuse.