JACK KETCHUM’S THE GIRL NEXT DOOR
(Moderncine 2006)

Review by Barry Meyer

 (SPOILER ALERT!)

JACK KETCHUM’S THE GIRL NEXT DOOR is one of the most disturbing, taboo-shattering horror movies to come along in recent memory. Films like SAW and HOSTEL aim desperately high towards the target of controversy, hoping to wow the audience with shock and awe.  But, their hearts are more in the studio pocketbook than in the guts of the audience. To truly shock someone, you first need to be willing to offend them, not just make them wince. You have to think beyond “what is the coolest way to cut someone’s finger off?” and dig back into the darker recesses of your fears to expose what is really frightening. JACK KETCHUM’S THE GIRL NEXT DOOR not only shocked and disturbed me, it truly moved me.

The film (based on Jack Ketchum’s gritty novel) is based on the real life murder of Sylvia Marie Likens, a teenage girl who endured months of sadistic torture, dealt out by Gertrude Baniszewski, the woman who was supposed to protect and care for her as the girl’s parents worked in a traveling carnival. For over three months, Baniszewski ordered her own children, as well as some on the neighborhood children, to beat, torture, humiliate and starve her charge.  With not one person to take pity on her horrific ordeal, Likens died naked and frail, with the words “I’M A PROSTITUTE AND PROUD OF IT” branded on her stomach. The saddest part is that no one seemed to care.
 

In JACK KETCHUM’S THE GIRL NEXT DOOR the horrific case is fictionalized, but the horrors the girl suffered are real.  Sixteen year-old Meg Loughlin (Blythe Auffarth) is a beautiful spirit who remains optimistic about life even after she and her sister Susan (Madeline Taylor) lose their parents in a car accident (an accident which left Susan needing braces on her legs).  The sisters are put under the care of Ruth Chandler, a middle-aged suburban divorcee with three sons (ages 7 to 14), who is amiably known to the neighborhood kids as “Auntie Ruth.” Her house has become a favorite hangout for the kids – mostly for the boys – with the TV set always on, beer and cigarettes dished out like milk and cookies, and where bawdy talk is frequently heard.  It’s not the ideal environment for Meg, but she finds a kinship with twelve year-old David Moran, the quiet, thoughtful next-door neighbor.

Already unhinged after a bitter divorce, Ruth seems to take delight in overworking her new charges, having them do the bulk of the chores while her own boys play.  There’s nothing the girls can do to ever please Ruth – especially Meg.  She works tirelessly all day, but her chores are never completed to Ruth’s satisfaction; she is slim and pretty, but Ruth only nags her to stay away from the food in the fridge; she is kind and courteous, but Ruth accuses her of being an insolent brat.  Ruth encourages her three boys to keep Meg in line, as well, using physical threats if need be.  Through it all, Meg remains in control, rising above the degradation.  But when Susan is punished in full view of all the boys in the neighborhood, her dress yanked up and her underwear pulled down to her ankles and viciously paddled Meg strikes back. For this show of “aggressiveness” Ruth decides to teach the neighborhood kids a lesson in how to break the spirit of a young woman.  These lessons take place in the dark, dank basement, where young Meg is bound and gagged and strung from the rafters, her clothes stripped away, left to the amusement of the boys.  The suffering that she endures, at the hands of Ruth and the neighborhood children (all ranging in age from 7 to 18), is beyond human endurance.  

With taboo shattering subject matter such as this, the movie could have easily gone all wrong.  It’s full of sadistic torture, rape, nudity, foul language – all involving children.  But fortunately, producer Andrew van den Houten and director Gregory Wilson knew that they needed to keep all the explosive behavior under strict control.  They understood that to truly shock the audience they didn’t need excessive gore and flesh, but a palpable story and a cast of characters who would bring believability to the entire ordeal.  Their most effective device is the active imagination of the audience.  The girl is nude, yes, and the children are all right there in the same shot surrounding her.  It’s a shocking image to see these little kids in this situation – but angles and edits are used to make the audience feel they’re seeing much more than this.
 

The casting of Blanche Baker as Ruth Chandler proves to be another important element in this film’s ultimate believability.  The temptation with such a role as Auntie Ruth would be to camp it up and bitch it out, like a middle-aged Joan Crawford in a housecoat.  But Baker’s understated evil comes off more as judiciousness and wit at first – amusing her pubescent and teenaged acquaintances with pearls of wisdom and tempered advice on how to be men. But then, confronted with the tutelage of two young girls, suddenly her womanhood is threatened, and the slow descent into the basement torture chamber is greeted with equal temperament.  Not once does Baker’s Ruth scowl or raise her voice, even as she orders the boys to beat the captive girl, or commands her own son to commit rape. Baker follows her gut instinct to pull back and simply allow the character to speak for herself.  Not since Hannibal Lecter has the screen seen such a coolly cunning, quietly terrifying villain as Ruth Chandler. 

At the opposite end of the spectrum is Meg Loughlin.  What makes this role work is the enchanting performance by Blythe Aurffarth, her ability to be captivating without an ounce of flirtation or coquettishness gives Meg the necessary innocence to make her a truly vulnerable and tragic character. She’s youthful, pert, pretty, and whimsical, all the things that Ruth is not and therefore despises.  Where Ruth must ply the boys with beer and saucy stories to get their attention,  Meg simply gives David an innocent, undesigned look at the gentle curve of her neck while gazing up at the starry sky, and he’s in adoration of her.  The friendship between the two kids is wholly uncorrupt and genuine, and touches on a level of kindred spirits. It’s this innocent relationship between David and Meg that ultimately spins Ruth out of control.

David’s strength and integrity, though, prove flawed. As the intensity of the assaults on Meg turn to torture and rape, he doesn’t do nearly enough to try and stop Ruth or his own friends.  Granted, the 1950s (the era in which the movie is set) was not a time when kids were encouraged to speak their minds freely, or disrespect their elders, but when one is witness first hand to the violence and torture inflicted upon another child, one would do anything to find a way to tattle – unless there were a serious threat held over them (this threat, by the way, does come later in the script, but only after David has witnessed unimaginable tortures and has had several chances at reaching out to an adult).  David’s lack of action is puzzling, and comes back to haunt him – as shown in the book-ended scenes featuring a guilt ridden adult David.  The story is about inaction and guilt, as much as it is about pain and redemption, but it would’ve been better served if David were put in more peril.

Once the story returns to the bowels of the Chandler house, though, and we witness the ordeal of Meg Loughlin, the questions of motivation become moot.  This is where the power of the story hits the audience.

JACK KETCHUM’S THE GIRL NEXT DOOR doesn’t play at being shocking… it actually is!  It doesn’t distract you with jittery images or blast you with loud noises like the movies in the torture chic clique do.  Instead, it goes after something even more terrifying than gore… truth.
 

    To read an interview with Jack Ketchum from Penny Blood #1, click here.