Death and the Maiden

Paulina, a young woman who was tortured during the dictatorship in an unspecified South-American country, is living in a lonely beach house with her husband - a lawyer who has just been appointed to investigate the previous regime's abuse of human rights. One day he brings home a stranger. Paulina listens to his voice and recognizes the man who tortured her 15 years ago. Based on Dorfman's The Maiden and Death, Polanski creates a film that is all his own - an aggressive and poignant confrontation about the politics of gender relations. Thanks to the cinematography, with a terrific performance by Sigourney Weaver and Ben Kingsley, the result is a disturbing drama about violence and revenge.