American Mary (2012) Online

American Mary is a strange story of revenge and finding one's niche in the world. It's easy to dismiss as a hack/slash piece of pulp, but I have to admit I enjoyed the film for its weird elements. It provides antagonists who are easy to hate and a protagonist who has a questionable lifestyle, yet is still very likable, due in no small part to actress, Katharine Isabella. She's smart, funny, and does a nice job handling a really bizarre story line. BE WARNED, this story is NOT for everyone. It has some very disturbing elements and is highly graphic in nature. That being said, the movie combines drama, dark comedy, and gore in a way I, as a viewer, found interesting. This is not a horror movie. Viewers going into the film with that notion will be disappointed. Again, this is a weird and graphic film and not for those who are easily (or even not so easily) disturbed. It has a questionable message and is weird in ways one may have never considered. It thought is was inventive and strange and I enjoyed the unexpected trip.

American Mary is a sleek and sexy film that is unpredictable and fairly unique. The story is dark, daring and entertaining, and solid production gives it clean and smooth look. It's body modification theme is edgy yet tasteful, and at times quite thought provoking. Katherine Isobelle plays the lead brilliantly; cold and brutal, but at the same time, empowering and elegant.

As for Faults, well, American Mary is a great film, but it peaks two-thirds of the way in, and by comparison it's ending feels a little timid and noncommittal.

Now, this is a bit over critical on my part, and it's only a minor flaw, but one that stands out as there are so few in the film. It's the cameo from the Soska sisters, I get it, I do, If I made a horror film, I'd want to be in it too, but this just wasn't the parts for them. Although I suspect they probably wrote it with themselves in mind. It's only a short scene but one with so much potential. The Soska sisters play big characters in a scene that could have been wonderfully unsettling, but instead its a bit flat and clumsy. The girls just didn't have the physical presence or screen confidence required to fill out the roles.

American Mary would have been excellent if it wasn't hindered by a few minor flaws and a weak ending. Overall, a delicate, but by no means tame, addition to the torture porn sub-genre. This film could easily become a horror cult classic, and deservingly so. I will be interested to see what the Soska sisters do next.

One of the most original horror films of recent years American Mary is a darkly comic gore- fest about revenge and back-street body modification.

Mary (Katherine Isabelle) is a promising and dedicated medical student who, like all students at one point or another in their studies, falls foul of financial difficulty. Lured into the world of body modification by the handsome prices offered by weirdos with a desire to make themselves more unique, Mary finds a way to continue her studies whilst earning some pretty good money. Wrongly assumed to have become a prostitute by her creepy professor she is invited to a sleazy surgeons party unaware that he has ulterior motives that make her new found profession start to take over her life.

American Mary is one of few horror films that's focus is on the female character's strength. Mary goes from being a hardworking model student to a psychotic body modification surgeon in a seedy strip club where she originally auditioned to work. The transformation from quiet student to headstrong surgical dominatrix after being violated is both empowering and contradictory of the traditional representation of women in horror. Katherine Isabelle is as charismatic as she is beautiful and she completely owns the character. She maintains an air of mystery which makes you constantly question her intentions towards the people she meets and her performance will keep you on your toes.

Darkly comedic and completely twisted American Mary is one damn good reason for women in the media to be more prevalent in the horror genre; there's no fluff in this film, no cliché crap and very little predictability. It has no eye-roll moments of exploitation and Isabelle's performance is empowering for women as well as easy on the eye for the men; a good balance that excludes neither gender from the audience like so many horror films do. The Soska sisters show their love for the horror genre and its brutality but also its more sexy side (which is weird considering all the blood, but there we go!) and American Mary is clearly a labour of love and not just some uncared for cliché torture porn that's been churned out as a money maker. The settings are seedy and dark and the sleazy underbelly of society is well portrayed but in an almost desirable fashion that enables us to see how easy it is for Mary to get sucked in to this world where money comes easily if you're willing to leave your comfort zone.

If you can ignore the occasionally questionable performances American Mary is an all round brilliant horror film that sucks you in to this brutal, seedy, sexy universe for 100 minutes and refuses to let your attention slip. What happens to Mary's professor is as genius as it is disturbing, but you will have to watch to find out for yourself.

Even at this early stage this interesting feature from Canada has the look of a future cult movie. It's decidedly left-field in subject matter. In it a female medical student with financial troubles turns to the shady world of underground surgeries. Before long she is carrying out more and more outlandish procedures. Pleasingly this one is directed by women. It's ridiculous in this day and age how rare it remains for women to be given the director's reigns. This film shows that the female vision can be very twisted and macabre indeed. The directors are identical twins Jen and Sylvia Soska who appear in a cameo as Eastern European sisters who crave bizarre body modifications. Their direction is very stylised but with grit where necessary. I'm not usually queasy when it comes to movies but I can honestly say that one surgical scene left me looking away. The third female presence is star Katherine Isabelle of Ginger Snaps fame. She is very good in a dark and sexy performance. She is a great anti-heroine and her revenge moment on a man who attacked her is one that had me inwardly cheering.

Seeing as this is a Canadian horror film perhaps a comparison with David Cronenberg is inevitable. But in this instance it's a fairly relevant one as in many ways this is another example of the body horror sub-genre. It's a film that combines contemporary sadistic horror with a view of an unusual subculture of people who modify their bodies through surgery. It isn't a very story driven film to be fair and it sometimes lacks a bit of overall dynamism but this is only a relatively minor observation and it is pleasingly original for the most part. Overall the feature could perhaps best be described as what would happen if Clive Barker was to direct a film that combined elements of Hard Candy and Audition.

Before any of you even make the slightest remark about watching a movie made by directors whose movies I didn't like I will tell you that I only watched it to see if the Soska's have improved. Well they did... Not by much though.

First and foremost. The plot is that Mary Mason is a broke medical student that will do anything to make money. She gets a call from someone asking if Mary can remove skin off another woman's nipples and sew her vagina shut. After that she begins to modify other people, making them freaks of nature. While this is happening she gets raped by her former lecturer. This results in her practicing her body modifying skills on him, dismembering him, sewing his mouth shut and other basic tortures.

Okay, where do I start? Nothing about this is scary. It's disgusting, but I don't see that as a form of horror. If you also don't see it as a form of horror then leave this where it is.

Then we move onto the acting. As usual The Soska's are crap. I know, they played a small role in this one but I think they deserve a special mention. I did hear from people that they needed a director to say "tone it down" but because I have seen them in movies directed by other people, they still weren't any good. When I heard that Katherine Isabelle was in this after seeing "Dead Hooker In A Trunk" I thought that she could maybe carry the movie. She didn't (which only says I overestimated her acting ability, nothing more). The rest are as forgettable as this review will be 10 years after you last read it.

If the goal of the Soska's was to create a movie where the audience just goes through the motions, not caring about a single thing that goes on screen nor have anything that really sticks out then they have succeeded with me.

But from what I've seen a majority of the people on IMDb think it's decent. If you want to ignore me and go for the popular choice then that is perfectly fine. But if you have a taste in movies that is like mine then avoid this Cronenberg imitation.

After a very lackluster 2012 Frightfest Festival with only a very few memorable films and much straight to video crap this came as a sensational blast. After a great deal of stuff showing rape as fan boy entertainment this was brilliant. The Soska Sisters have added a feminist spin to a Cronenburgesque tale of body modification and surgery. There is a lot of stuff here about body image and The reason this film was so compelling a many but include: 1. Oscar worthy central performance which makes it the best Horror acting for ages. 2. Sheer unpredictability 3. A horror film by and about women 4. Real setting not a suburban Disneyland 5. Cool and stylish direction that thankfully restrained itself when you thought you were just about to witness something that might need a sick bag. 6. Make up and prosthetics that showed you stuff you definitely won't see in the average Horror. I could go on but you really need to see this if you like Horror and it deserves to be seen by a wider audience (although I doubt ti will succeed with a multiplex crowd)

The body modification sub culture is sort of the like the old time carnival freak show. People surgically mold, sculpt and pierce their way into something else but the person on the inside stays the same. The 2012 film "American Mary" features Katherine Isabelle, the breakout star of 2001's "Ginger Snaps", as a Med student who finds herself performing body mod surgeries that she finds out is quite good at.

Being a poor college student Mary Mason answer's a Craig's List style ad for a sleazy strip club owned by an even sleazier younger guy. During her "interview" something goes terribly wrong outside and Mary if offered $5,000 to do some impromptu surgery on some guy. She is freaked out but does it. Word gets around to the underground body mod culture and she is approached by some pretty strange characters to help them finish their work. Isabelle plays Mary perfectly, she is desperate enough too take these strange jobs, but is still grounded and very professional. She provides a desperately needed service to the extremely rich who believe she is an artist who works in the medium of skin.

She is first pursued by Beatrice who has transformed his/her body into Betty Boop. After completing a surgery on her for $10,000, her friend Ruby comes calling next. Rudy is transforming her body to look like an anatomically incorrect Barbie Doll and has a few things cut off and one thing sewn up. The film has a darkly comedic thread throughout. Ruby, Beatrice and the others are all portrayed as good people on the inside, but different on the out. While the exact opposite is true about the other so-called normal people.

Back at school Mary is invited to a swanky party thrown by one of the big shot surgeons, but she has unknowing just stepped into the lions den. She is drugged and raped by the surgeon, but little does he know the unique skills that Mary has recently acquired. Mary exacts swift and painful revenge upon the Doc. Making him her test subject for new procedures, keeping him alive and aware the whole time.

"American Mary" is full of interesting unique characters and well played throughout. It was written and directed by the Soska twins, Jen and Sylvia, who also play parts as customers to Mary. They bring a real sense of authenticity and care to the film, that would have been lost had it been done by anybody else.

I was at first a bit hesitant to watch this movie, because the description made it seem like torture porn. Only after seeing many reviews that did not paint it as such, I decided to give it a try. In retrospect, I wish someone would have called it torture porn to keep me from watching it.

Getting that out of the way, I am not labeling this movie as torture porn, but it is the furthest thing from it. I have to commend the filmmakers for taking a concept that screamed of a torture porn plot but avoided making it such. The writers and directors tried to make this film less about the body modifications as it was about the change in personality of the lead character. However, they did such a poor job doing this that they should have just made an idiotic torture porn movie.

"American Mary" is basically a film about a poor med student who begins to take body modification jobs to keep her bills paid. At first she is reluctant to do so, but this changes over time. When one of her former professors drugs her and rapes her, she quits med school and after beginning a long revenge scenario with him, she becomes a very distant shell of what she previously was. The nice girl trying to get through school becomes emotionally blank and immorally bankrupt.

This movie fails because its plot is way too unlikely. Mary's change happens too quickly and it seems to come about as the means for a plot device and not her character. By the time you get half way through the movie, any sympathy for Mary is gone. She has no morals and no redeeming factors.

This is a dreary and boring and terrible film I suggest you skip over.

Boy, these two sister for sure have no frigging clue about how to tell a story (by film). Don't get me wrong, I think that's (at least potentially) some good material right here - body-modifications in the context of horror. Come on! That sounds a lot more promising than your next silly zombie/ghost/fantasy flick. And I'm pretty sure someone capable (in telling a story and filmmaking - both separate problems) could tell one hell of a story somewhere along that "Blody Mary".

First to the story-telling: so you have that idea about a film with extreme body-modifications. Great. I already smell(ed) all kind of horrors. But where would you take such a thing and what would you do with it? What side of the human nature are you going to explore? Something along the lines of mutilation/self-destruction versus correction or beautification? Or rather something more wicked along the lines of Frazer's "On edge"?

Nope. You won't get much of anything the like or even slightly interesting. Unforuntately the soska sisters aren't much of explorers (which great film-makers, or more generally story-tellers, are!), so they don't explore (as in illuminate) anything. Not in particular anyways. This is a film where "being raped" is all the character development you'll get. But mind you, this is no "Irreversible". Not at all.

Why was this rape-plot even necessary? As a catalyst? Nah... just to setup that revenge-sub-plot. And why was that really necessary? Because there would be no horror left. That's why. You see, that's the main problem: since not exploring anything, the soska sisters didn't manage to come up with a good (or horrifying) main plot. Extreme body-modification? Sure, no big deal, just count from 100 to zero and you'll be fine! They wake up and live happily ever after. Nothing else happens. No complications whatsoever. Nobody dies. No drama. Nothing. Just the barbie doesn't want to be regarded as sex object, that's why she 1) got herself huge breast implants(?! - and don't even try to argue here; we clearly are shown the scarfs from that booby-surgery) to then 2) remove the nipples (they might have removed brains in an additional step...).

So there's nothing. Let's have some rape and then we can have the revenge-horror! DUUHHH. Also there is a cop that doesn't do anything, but hurray: another useless and derivative sub-plot! They tried so hard to create any kind of suspense... it's not even funny and it doesn't work on any level.

Second; the filmmaking: it's horrendous. There is no flow, cuts and whole scenes are more often irritating than not. Ultimatively the soska sisters struggle with film language. A lot (to the point that it gets hell(!) of annoying!).

'American Mary' (2012) is the story of a would-be surgeon (she's attending medical college) with money problems who suddenly finds 'underground' work lucrative. Soon she's performing increasingly freakish 'body modification' procedures for fabulous sums, and her 'fame' grows. This one played out like a black comedy until around a quarter of the way in when something nasty happens to Mary which skews the screenplay into something a lot darker. It is an unusual movie but one which held my complete attention until the end; not something which happens every time with the horror genre. There's a little of the David Cronenberg, even David Lynch about it. Bonus; the classical music on the soundtrack (especially at the end) was lovely enough for me to seek out on the Net.

Movie review:The twisted twins, Sylvia and Jen Soska, are back with their second full length feature. Now that people are taking notice to their talent, this time they have a budget (although they did need to take out a second mortgage to get the project off the ground). Anyway, this movie is about Mary, a brilliant med student studying to be a surgeon. Of course, money issues arise, as seems to always happen to college kids, so she decides stripping may be the way to go. While "interviewing" for the job, a strange occurrence puts here in the helm of a situation where she is needed to perform surgery at the club for quick cash. She soon realizes that maybe under the table surgical procedures may become a way to make money, so when a woman tracks her down after finding her resume at the club, she takes on a second patient. Mary finds herself juggling the task of student and surgeon on the side. Well, the life of being a student is crossed when she is invited to a "party" where she is the guest of honor, so to speak, and the world of the actual surgeons take a toll on her as she is drugged and raped. This incident pushes Mary over the edge and she takes matters into her own hands. This movie does a wonderful job weaving the tale of a woman that is forced into a life she wasn't prepared for, that of BME and revenge. It follows her downward spiral balancing reality with the virtually psychotic road she has chosen. The movie is much more polished than it's predecessor and it shows in the quality of camera-work and editing. The acting is very well done by Katherine Isabelle as Mary, and the other actors hold their own in their respective roles. Of course, the blood and gore is there, but not as extensive as their previous effort. It really wasn't needed for the story the twins wrote. American Mary had a limited theater release so you may or may not have had the chance to see it. If not, I again highly suggest that you see this movie. It is good to see new talent emerging with entertaining movies that don't follow the cookie cutter mold Hollywood has been giving us. 6.4/10 IMDb 6.0 . I very much anticipate the next release from these two.

I was fortunate enough to attend a screening of gory horror American Mary followed by a Q&A session with the co-writers and directors, Jen and Sylvia Soska, and star Katharine Isabelle. Okay, scrap the 'fortunate'. And the scariest parts of the evening were the claim by the Soska twins that "Some people have said this is the best film they have ever seen!" and the bloke who told us all about the operations he was due to have on his legs before enquiring from the trio if he should go ahead.

There's very little good to say about American Mary. I entered the screening room with high hopes and departed wide-eyed and dismayed. It's embarrassing to laugh at unintentionally funny moments in a film but there were plenty of them. American Mary is indeed shocking, but not in a good way.

American Mary is clearly a vanity project from two girls whose executive producer parents apparently (part) funded the project. Two girls who have watched Human Centipede once too often. Two girls who are trying reeeeally hard to be rebellious and shock the world by doing naughty things on screen and swearing pointlessly and with embarrassing amounts of emphasis on each expletive just so we get how rude they're being. Such pain! Even in the Q&A they tried desperately hard to shock; the first sentence out of their mouths referring to some scallywag as a f****** c*** and then repeated, over-egged obscenities punctuating inane responses to toadying fanboy questions. Oh, to have been shocked and offended. That would have been a joy compared to the embarrassment of watching three children showing off to a roomful of adults. There's an old adage: If you want to be seen, stand up; if you want to be heard, speak up; if you want to be respected, shut up. I saw, I heard, I departed and I averted my gaze.

American Mary is a horror flick about a disenchanted surgery intern, Mary (Isabelle) with financial worries who is sucked into the very dark side of plastic surgery aka body modification aka freakish mutilation. It starts out as a way for Mary to earn money (via torture and creating Barbie lookalikes) then becomes a hobby and finally a way to exact revenge and satisfy her perverse whims.

I don't have a problem with the subject matter; it's great to be challenged. I have a problem with the dire script, the god-awful cod accents (the worst of which are from the Soska twins who cast themselves as, um, freakish twins) and the horrendous sound mix that changes mid-scene (!) and at one point had us all looking over our left shoulders to work out which member of the audience was moaning, only to realize it was the character off-screen in an entirely different direction! Random scenes are plonked into the film to separate others and to imply the passage of time. A cringeworthy scene in which Mary learns some news of her grandmother prompts further smothered guffaws and is just one more reason to condemn this amateurish tripe. This is just one long, clumsy, pointless film that really wants to be offensive but succeeds in being virtually irrelevant.

Certainly there are a couple of moments when the stomach twinges with the implied gore, but mostly the horror is in the performance. Paula Lindeberg is so ridiculously excessive in her performance as the plasticized Ruby Realgirl with her squeaky voice and clapping hands that Isabelle comes across as subtlety incarnate. Antonio Cupo plays strip joint owner Billy Barker as though auditioning to play Mark Ruffalo and when John Emmet Tracy wanders on to the screen with intended sincerity as Detective Dolor, the thud was the sound of many jaws bouncing on the floor. Why does an American detective in an American film set in America have a 'British' accent? Well, according to Soska and Soska it's because they wanted their detective to sound exactly like their hero Clive Barker. It would appear no-one told them Barker is a Liverpudlian who now speaks with an LA drawl. Yup, that's about the level of American Mary.

So why does American Mary earn two stars? Because the art direction triumphs, the set is pretty, the principal prosthetics are perfect and Mary's costumes get progressively sexier as the film rolls on. Costume designer Jayne Mabbott is by far and away the star of American Mary and by the time Mary dons her red surgeon's gown in a reference to Dead Ringers, Mabbott has made her the most erotic murderess on the big screen.

Perhaps next time Soska and Soska are let lose with a camera they should be 'encouraged' to spend their budget on a few more talents like Mabbott.

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Katherine 'Ginger Snaps' Isabelle stars as cash-strapped medical student Mary Mason, who decides on stripping as a means of extra income (she certainly has the right qualifications for the job!). During her interview ("strip off and show us what you've got"), Mary's career takes an unexpected turn, her boss-to-be offering her an alternative way to earn big bucks: as a back-street surgeon fixing up shady characters in need of medical attention.

Mary's reputation as an unscrupulous medical genius for hire soon reaches the ears of stripper Beatress Johnson, part of the on-line body modification community, who pays her $10,000 to perform an unorthodox operation on her friend Ruby. Mary's improved financial status doesn't go unnoticed by her instructor Dr. Grant (David Lovgren), who surmises that his star pupil is on the game, and that it would be perfectly OK if he got himself a freebie. Drugging and raping her at a party proves to be a bad idea, however, for Mary isn't about to take that sort of thing lying down (OK, she does take it lying down, but you know what I mean).

With a little help from her strip-club owner pal Billy (Antonio Cupo), Mary exacts bloody revenge, but seems to lose most of her marbles in the process...

As you can probably tell, American Mary, directed by twin sisters Jen and Sylvia Soska, is a rather preposterous tale, one that frequently borders on the ridiculous in its desire to be as demented as possible; as such it is difficult to be absolutely certain of the filmmakers' intentions. Is this supposed to be a serious, tragic body-shock horror experience in the vein of fellow Canadian auteur Cronenberg (whose film Dead Ringers gets a visual reference) or a sly parody of the genre with split tongue planted in pierced cheek?

Whatever the case, American Mary is certainly a consistently entertaining experience thanks to its provocative 'body modification' subject matter, excellent in-your-face gore, and Isabelle's bold central performance.

Plot: Mary Mason, a medical student studying to become a surgeon, gets into some shady business when she applies for a job to get some extra cash. The young student is quickly thrown into a world of body modification, and she is becoming the go-to person for the most extreme of modifications.

Our thoughts: I might be in a minority of reviewers: I never watched or wanted to watch "Dead Hooker in a Trunk". It should've interested me, but it never did. It happens with certain titles, and this was one of them. It certainly didn't help that my partner on the website reviewed that one, which means I didn't even have a "professional" (hah!) reason to watch it. I haven't had much interest in the Soska sisters, and that's nothing personal, but when Katharine Isabelle got attached to "American Mary" I'll admit to being interested. As a huge fan of the "Ginger Snaps" trilogy, why wouldn't I be?

"American Mary" (it could be called "Canadian Mary", since Katharine is Canadian and so is the movie, but let's not be silly now!) tells the story of Mary Mason. She's a medical student who hopes to become surgeon one day. Hell, she's far along too, and quite a good student to boot. If you ignore her attitude, of course. She's more skilled than the majority of her class. But being a student of any kind means you're probably broke, just like Mary is. Her desperation leads her to apply for a job as a stripper, but the job interview takes a weird turn when someone associated with the club is in need of surgery - quick. Mary's dragged in and she has to perform surgery on this really messed up man. It's quite the job for a medical student to do, but she does it. And it changes her. People hear about what she did, and she gets contacted by people that are into extreme body modifications such as trying to look like a doll or Betty Boop. Mary soon throws away her ambitions to become a typical surgeon, and becomes a popular name in the underground world of body modifications.

What is the rise and the fall of a movie like "American Mary"? The rise for me most definitely is that Katharine Isabelle plays the lead role. She's a really likable actor, and it's hard not to want to watch a horror movie with her in it. Another rise (you know I mean "positive thing", right?) is that the storyline is quite to the point and easy to get into. Also the effects are quite good.

Let's look at the negative things of "American Mary", which are often much stronger than the positive things. Most importantly is that I find little-to-no character development in our lead character. Even though Katharine Isabelle is likable, her character is not. And her character remains equally unlikable from start to finish. It would be understandable if a nice girl (nice girls can be strong too) becomes hardened and "bitchy" through-out the things that happen in the movie, but Mary starts with bitchy attitude and ends with bitchy attitude. There are just a few scenes that show anything beside that in her, and that's a real shame.

Katharine Isabelle is still the better actor in the movie, hands down, and I don't mind watching her even if she's not likable. Several actors are less than fantastic, and sadly that can be said about our director duo too. The moment the two of them enter the movie it becomes rather silly with their German accents. The kind of focus that is put on the two characters makes you think that they would be a big part of the story down the line, but they aren't. It's understandable if directors put themselves or people they know in movies, but I don't know what the reason for this kind of attention to two characters is if they are not gonna be important. No surprise, perhaps, that they decided to make their characters the most odd ones in the movie - if you could choose your own role in a film, I'm sure you'd want something that stands out too. But Jen, Sylvia, you should probably rethink putting you in too much focus just because you are in the movie.

"American Mary" lacks a lot of things that would draw me into the movie. But it works as a rather shallow horror movie about body modification. It has several scenes that are underwhelming in both emotion and artistic decisions, characters that you don't develop, failed attempts at shock. Let's be honest - in 2013 it takes quite a lot to come off as shocking, and you either have to really show the most despicable things imaginable, or have us so invested in our character that it hurts us when they are hurt. "American Mary" is a few hundred miles away from that. I don't think it's a terrible watch, and some parts of it are quite alright so it definitely works as weekend entertainment.

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"American Mary" is the story of the medical student who is drawn into the seedy underworld of illegal body modifications. Despite the praise this film and its directors have received, it's a mess of lazy writing, stale revenge-flick tropes, and predictable torture scenes.

The first act is promising. Mary Mason is a medical student who is flat broke, and goes to a strip club to apply for a sleazy but high-paying gig that will keep her afloat while she finishes her medical degree. When the mob boss running the club suddenly needs to prolong a mutilated man's life, he enlists her help. Before long, Mary is getting lucrative referrals for increasingly bizarre surgeries.

Initially, the film appears to deliver on its promise. Katherine Isabelle is convincing as a competent but vulnerable woman who is out of her league. The narrative is smart and compelling. However, it does not take long for the film to go off the rails and lose us completely.

(SPOILERS FOLLOW)

Mary is invited to a university faculty party where she is raped by a trusted instructor. While many skilled writers and directors are able to handle the subject matter of rape intelligently, here it's used as a lazy plot device to get her to wholeheartedly turn evil and embrace a life of crime. This new Mary dresses like a dominatrix, enjoys inflicting pain, and revels in the criminal element which once frightened her. It's a huge change brought about in an extremely contrived manner, and it takes the audience out of a film in a way which never allows us to fully return.

Mary goes on doing more and more extreme surgeries, but there is nothing really driving the film from this point on. The revenge on the professor is dispensed with almost immediately. The story then plods on with surgery after surgery and the occasional bout of vengeance, but we already know how the story will end. There's no suspense, and we are left to wait until the directors have decided that they are done with us.

The Soska Sisters have drawn acclaim for being a much-needed female voice in the male-dominated horror genre. It is thoroughly undeserved. Even if this film had not used rape as a plot device, there is nothing here that hundreds of male directors could not have offered us. The body modification horror is actually quite banal; we're supposed to be shocked by suspension piercing, horns, and sub-dermal implants which are actually completely legal and known to anyone familiar with the real-world body-modification community. "American Mary" is the worst kind of horror film, the kind that fails to shock, scare, or amuse its audience.

Whilst I may not be a pro at reviewing films by any stretch of the imagination, I feel compelled to give American Mary by the Soska sisters the highest praising review I can muster.

My expectations for the film were high, having been caught up in the hype around the critically acclaimed body-mod horror - thankfully I was pleasantly surprised. There was a lot of room for error in making the film, but Jen and Sylvia approached the gory side of the film perfectly, letting the viewer see just enough to be grossed out but not enough to warrant a sick bag. Whilst I was expecting fake blood and guts galore, the story and themes within the film were strong enough not to need the usual cheap thrills one might expect in a horror film, in fact I think the film wouldn't have been as good were there more gore. On top of this, the characters were interesting/well developed and thanks to a couple of good casting calls and better performances (namely Katharine Isabelle and Tristan Risk) I found it easy to connect to them in the 103 minutes I watched them on screen.

As many others have commented, it's rare to find female horror directors that manage to hit the nail on the head quite as well as the Twisted Twins have manged to here, fingers crossed for a next project equally as exciting.

This film follows the lovely, naive Mary's descent into darkness. Unfortuanlty this is literally what it does. Mary has a hell of a few bad days, then descends into darkness; roll credits.

Watching her journey is a bit like watching a sex education film. Interesting stuff is going on but you are not part of it and you just have to sit watching uncomfortably until it is over.

The acting, script, lighting etc. is all good. Katharine gives a stella performance, easily pulling off sweet, sexy and sinister, but it is not enough.

There is initially an intriguing insight into a sub culture of people who want to express themselves through physical modification. But all the members of this culture turn out to be stupid, weak or cruel.

Not much gore but there are some disturbing scenes.

This has all the right ingredient but is non-engaging and dull.

I put this film on this Saturday night,31st Oct 2015,after coming across it whilst looking for a good horror movie that might give proper scares/jumps or better still,when you get a chill right up your spine & things that makes you grateful not to be in any situation at all that resembles that level of pain !! Anyway,so I sat down to watch it,(hopeful its a good one),around half an hour into it the very strange characters appeared & it started to get more of my full attention, (you will see what I mean). Without making any spoilers I can safely tell you that,this is one of these films you turn shouldn't turn off,cause you'll miss the very bits of others who watched all of it talk about,so just keep watching. Lastly I would recommend getting comfy,get some munchies (for hardened horror fans,not if your squeamish) tell everyone else to shut up or leave the room for a couple of hours !! Now your ready to watch this VERY,VERY GOOD MOVIE,It takes a movie like this for me to give an 8 star rating,but this one is an easy 8,especially for a horror,ENJOY !!

I really wasn't expecting much of this going in, so I was pleasantly surprised at the talent on display, much better than the average indie flick from unknown directors. The acting is really first-rate all round, without exception, and with particularly creepy turns by Paula Lindberg and Tristan Risk, especially. Other reviewers have pointed out the debt to Cronenberg, and there is a good deal of that same unsettling fascination for the human body throughout the film. The first third I was very much impressed, at the sound, the cinematography, the atmosphere, and I almost believed the inevitable wouldn't rear its head but no, 40 mins in, up it came, right on schedule.

Here's a new Bechdel test for women directors: try, just once, making a film WHERE NOBODY GETS RAPED. Apparently, this is much, much harder than it sounds, but TRY. Push yourself. I know you can do it. Try making a film in which men are actually human beings, and one whole half of the human race, instead of just some monolithic, oppressive 'Them'.

This is a misandric film because there are no normal men in it: all of them, without exception, are depicted as evil, weak and pathologically hateful towards women. All men are either thugs or psychopaths. The only even slightly tolerated male character is the bouncer at the strip bar, (a thug Mary can manipulate to do violence for her) who gives her sandwiches and milkshakes, while telling her not to feel bad about killing people: "you make sure they deserve it, then don't waste a minute of your time after they're done". Yeah, you go, girl. Oh and there's a detective in it who actually gets to say (to the twisted monster serial killer) "YOU'RE the victim here, Mary!!".

As usual, a single by-the-books fictional wrong is manipulatively inserted only to justify all the prolonged, orgasmic and utterly reprehensible violence upon men that then follows. None of it was surprising, and all of it is very much a cliché by now. Why do all films by women filmmakers dislike men so much? If you reverse the genders there is no way that this film could even be made, because both women and men would find the violence against women so reprehensible that no-one would show it, it would probably be banned, and certainly no-one would refer to the sick butcher within it as 'sexy'. Correct? But no-one in the reviews here or elsewhere even bats an eyelid at the genocidal hatred here displayed, they simply say it has 'a feminist slant', and leave it at that. And that hatred DOES emanate from feminist propaganda, so I guess they have a point, but it's a pretty ugly message it's selling, when all is said and done.

I don't want to completely trash the film, as there are, as I've said, more than a few good points in its favour, but it sure leaves a bad taste in the mouth.

Okay, so after reading and hearing some good reviews, I finally got the time to view this film. It was a very slow start and the acting seemed very wooden and amateurish to say the least. The film has no atmosphere and was not engaging at all. I had to check twice if I was actually watching the same film for which I had read the reviews just to make sure I wasn't watching some cheep parody or knock-off. I find it astonishing how anyone sees anything in this film, the only thing I can rate about this film is the theme of body-mod and objectification. Everything else scores a big fat ZERO. Finally, horror is meant to be scary or frightening, this was horrifyingly rubbish, and frighteningly boring.

This film starts of quite well and gets you involved in the story from the beginning. It was made by the Soska twin sisters and it tells the story of a medical student trying to work her way to becoming a great surgeon. But as she finds out there are people who like to take advantage of you when you are trying to make ends meet. It stars Katharine Isabelle (GINGER SNAPS) and she plays the role of medical student Mary Mason very well. The Soska twins have a little role each in the film also. I did like the story and how it moves along and some of the scenes are quite cringe worthy. The plot has a revenge element to it and you understand why Mary ends up doing what she does. This would have to be one of the Soska's better movies to date in my opinion. A great little horror flick. I give it a solid 7.5 out of 10.

Mary becomes increasingly poor, and disenchanted with the surgical world she once admired.

The allure of easy money sends Mary into the world of underground surgeries which ends up leaving more marks on her......... than on her so called freakish clients......

The Soska twins/sisters/whatever, try and give us a movie that will shock and make us think, but look underneath all the freakish abnormalities and the parlour tricks, it's basically another 'all men are b***ards' and girl power is forever.

And this is why the movie fails on many levels. Its not the casts fault, Isabelle is a wonderful screen presence, and next to Danielle Harris, she is the second best female working in horror today.

It all has a retro punk nineties feel to it, almost like Hardware or even The Crow, and this gives the film a little seedy feel to it.

It's a gory film, and the men are portrayed as pigs with no brains, but the most disturbing thing I found to be was the Betty Boop faced 'associate', and this was a work of genius, probably the best factor of the film.

If you have just finished with your boyfriend, and hate men at the moment, you will probably love this, if not, it's nothing really new, apart from some good make up and a great performance from Isabelle.

A little offensive, not all males are pigs..

I was looking forward to seeing this movie, I like Katherine and the concept looked good. This movies was a complete failure. Katherine acted so emotionless throughout the movie that the character became boring and her motivations were not understood. I especially hated her money problems, a American med student would have a crazy amount of debt, and she had already been dealing with it for years. Also the rape scene...ugh...This movies would be-more interesting if based in reality, the surgeries should have been more realistic, arm transplant would be impossible and it would have been cooler if the surgeries would have been failures. The ending came out of no where. Don't see this movie it sucked.

Female directors are rare. Female horror directors even rarer. Female twin sister directors who do horror movies? Well we found one pair and the movie I had the pleasure to watch was really good. The idea as it is might not be original (especially if you follow the media, there are some cases of this beauty craze in Russia and other countries), but it does fit fine into this story.

Plus we have a great female lead. You might feel that her drive is slowed down at one point mid-through the film, but that would mean you're missing the point. It's more character driven than story driven. And it works that way. Social commentary and other things included of course. Watch it if you can

I am giving this film a high rating for the creativity of the plot, story, and sets. I would call it slick and sexy. Katharine I. did a great job....probably on those hotist lists after this flick.

This horror story is obscure and almost fun except for all the gore. Most horror flicks just stick to that. This one is a revenge horror film too aside from the other obscure aspects.

I think the Soska sisters may be a pair to watch after seeing this. At least for this genre.

Skipped through some of the more graphic scenes actually, they were just too much for us.