Gardens of the Night (2008)

I'm always looking for extreme and disturbing films. Disturbing film aficionados will know about 'A Serbian Film', 'Salo', 'Martyrs', 'Nekromantik', and the rest. Nothing has ever made me cringes much, or even ever stop watching a film....until this film. I didn't even think this was going to be a disturbing film. I knew is was a risqué topic but didn't think it would be the most disturbing film I've ever seen. I had to turn if off for a little bit. Just imaging my little girl in that situation broke my heart. I couldn't stop imaging it happening to my little girl and I felt so uneasy I had to turn it off twice and try to watch something else. So I turned it on and left it on. My objective is to install an appropriate level of fear in myself and think about what I can do to avoid this with my daughter and other children.No film has ever stuck with me like this one. No film has ever given me such anxiety. No film has ever made me so uncomfortable and shocked at human behavior. I understand violence but, child exploitation is not something I understand at all. I am moved. I gave this film an 8. Not a 10 because I prefer films that make me feel good. Not a 1 because this is a hard subject done right and that doesn't take the topic over the line (i.e. no child nudity/sexual acts). It seriously does go to the edge though. Very wall thought out and directed. Was a tight rope to walk for the director.

This movie was an excellent portrayal of what I suspect is a realistic account of a girl & boy growing up way too fast. What happens to the children on milk cartons? This movie endeavors to show what too often can & does. I can hardly think of a more serious topic, but I want to reassure viewers that the movie is filmed in a way that reveals the horrible situations with integrity & nothing graphic is shown. Your only repulsion should come from an expanded understanding of what can happen to children and the twisted ways their minds are manipulated to deal with the perverse dilemmas they are forced to reconcile in their young minds. The movie deals with so many issues in under two hours, which is impressive. Abduction, underage sex trafficking, methods of sex traffickers, runaways, homeless youth, the world-view & hardened emotions that manifest in dealing in this world, & the stories of extremely difficult survival for kids with no home. Again, it is amazing the director accomplished all of this subject matter without exploiting the actors themselves. While the ideas are revolting, your heart responds with a greater love & understanding of the victims of this ugly subculture of humanity.Jillian Jacobs is astounding in a hardened but not too hard role as a teen who has been pushed beyond the limits of morality & maintains a softness & concern for others, rejecting the behaviors of abuse & subjugation she has been exposed to. Sadly, this is not common in the family life cycle. Normally, we learn from what we see and experience & then duplicate that in our own lives, because how would we know otherwise? As this movie involved the journey of a boy & a girl through hell on earth, it should come as no surprise to hear it was a gripping thriller that demanded to be watched to completion. I enjoyed it because it informed my imagination & broadened my understanding of the causes & effects of many of our culture's most despicable acts & brought to life in as tasteful way as I could imagine, how these events are processed by children. Any movie that expands our collective consciousness achieves one of the cinema's primary objectives & deserves our heartfelt appreciation. I rate this a 7/10 stars because of all of the above & the way Jillian Jacobs toes the line in her portrayal of a thoroughly sympathetic character throughout. This was not an easy role. If you enjoy thrillers & dramas & wouldn't mind becoming more informed about these issues, this is a must-see movie. Knox D. Alford, III

It is difficult to make a movie about childhood abductions. You can't risk traumatising the child actors. You dare not make it so realistic that you are accused of producing porn for sexual predators that encourages them to crime. What actor wants a role more stigmatising than Norman Bates? apparently Tom Arnold.This movie tackles the problem by showing a series of events perhaps 1% as traumatic as a real abduction, letting you fill in the other possibilities with your imagination. They chose a child actor for the abducted child, Leslie, who had no skill at acting at all. She is not in the least convincing, which makes her performance unreal, sort of a Kabuki telling of a story rather than a realistic re-enacting of events.Certain things made no sense. Young Leslie is hopelessly naive. No child of her age could be that unaware of the dangers of interacting with strangers. The abductors do a dry run and release Leslie to identify them. That makes absolutely no sense.Later we see Leslie as a teen. She smokes. She is addicted to cocaine. She is a hooker and a pimp. She treats her friends with contempt. She lives in squalor. She has a general screw-you to everyone and everything. The only bright spot in her life is a boy, Donny, who was abducted around the same time she was who has maintained his devotion to her, even though she spits on him.A counselor (John Malkovich) figures out who she is and arranges a visit home to be reunited with her parents. The family is like the Ward and June Cleavers. She feels too soiled to fit in and leaves in the middle of the night without leaving word. And the movie ended.I could not decipher what she planned to do next -- try to find her boyfriend, take up hooking again, something else? I did not really care. She had become such a selfish monster.You saw no transition from the lamb-like abducted child to the hard- boiled hooker. They seemed two completely unrelated people. If someone were to make another film with a similar theme, they should fill in some of the transition.Though he gets top billing, Malkovich has only a bit part, most of which he spends reading forms aloud.

This is a good movie. In fact, it's an exceptionally well done movie that tackles an impossibly difficult and even horrific subject and that, as a result, makes it often a very difficult movie to watch. It's not a sob-story happy ending kind of movie, either, so by the time it comes to an end you don't really feel at all uplifted. In fact, you feel kind of worn down, upset - even angry.The subject of the movie is child sexual exploitation. A darker, seedier and more disturbing storyline probably doesn't exist. It revolves around Leslie (played by Ryan Simpkins as a young child and Gillian Jacobs as a teen.) Leslie is kidnapped at the age of 8 and essentially forced into a life of child prostitution. Thankfully, nothing graphic is shown (obviously nothing sexual, and no physical abuse of any kind, really), but just knowing the situation makes your heart bleed for this girl and at times ties your stomach in knots.The kidnapper is played by Tom Arnold. The portrayal of a sick man luring his victim into his clutches and gradually making her more and more dependent on him to the point at which he can take her out in public and she won't try to escape or tell anyone what's going on is truly disturbing. There's no real closure with Arnold's character of Alex, either. Somehow Leslie and her friend Donnie (who was held captive as well) are just all of a sudden on their own. There's no mention of how they got away, or of what happened to Alex.One piece of advice: this seems to me to be a pretty accurate depiction (a psychological one mostly) of children being kidnapped and then sexually exploited. It's filmed mostly from Leslie's point of view, so it is a hard movie, and if you watch a tough movie expecting (and even needing) everything to work out in the end and everybody to live happily ever after then don't watch this. It's not a fairy tale. Not in any way, shape or form. It's dark and disturbing from the first to the last moment. But if you can get through that, it's also a very powerful and well made movie. (8/10)