Jack Ketchum`s The Girl Next Door

Jack Ketchum`s The Girl Next Door. It isn`t easy to find words for this one. Far from a graphically violent film but an authentically dark one nonetheless, made even more so by its basis in reality. The film is based on the book by Jack Ketchum which in turn was inspired by a real case. I won`t go into too much detail about that as I am talking more about the film here but its simple enough to google, it is quite famous. Though I will say the film is actually more tame than the book and the real case which given the films content is quite baffling... And depressing.

The film follows a young boy named David living in 1950`s suburbia along with his group of misfit neighborhood friends. One day two new girls who`s parents died in a car crash move into the neighbor "Aunt Ruth`s" house where the gang hang out. David quickly notices that the usually chill matriarch of the gang Aunt Ruth is uncharacteristically cruel to these new girls. Insulting them, beating them etc. This quickly begins to escalate until Ruth ties up the older of the girls in the basement. She then begins inviting over all the kids, boys and girls from their group of friends to come down and torture and exploit the "Little Slut" in increasingly sadistic ways. David does his best to secretly help the poor girls while avoiding the suspicion of the rest of the group as they become more violent by the day, or worst of all Aunt Ruth herself.

The film is a very bleak affair made all the worse by its basis in reality as can be seen in the picture above. It is probably one of the more accessible of these kids of films for new comers to the more extreme side of horror. The actors (who are mostly children and teenagers) do a fantastic job at selling the film and Aunt Ruth is one hell of a villain. She reminds me of Ilsa: She Wolf of the SS in that she is such a sadistic bitch and the fact that she is allowing these children to beat, rape and mutilate the poor girl while her little sister watches is pretty damn bleak. Overall Jack Ketchum`s The Girl Next Door is a great film which can potentially give you quite a poke in the ribs with its realistic suburban hell.