Chaos

Shockingly violent and surprisingly funny, this French thriller about women exacting all manner of vengeance on the abusive men in their lives is a delicious antidote to moviedom's typical characterization of women as simpering victims. The unlikely team of Hélène (Catherine Frot), an ignored and taken-for-granted housewife, and Noémie (Rachida Brakni), a prostitute and recovering heroin addict, plot the ruin of the latter's monster of a pimp (Wojtek Pszoniak) in a way that thwarts all filmic clichés of both the housewife and the hooker, in the process smashing the madonna/whore dichotomy that often informs the depiction of women in mainstream movies. But make no mistake: this is no inscrutable art house film--it's a rousing, nail-biting, edge-of-the-seat revenge truffle that, were it not for the subtitling that seems to turn off mainstream moviegoers, would play to packed multiplex houses. Cuz there's barely a woman alive who doesn't crave a little retaliation against the crimes, great and small, that men commit. Recommended. (M. Johanson)