Death and the Maiden (1995)

Synopsis: Roman Polanski's suspenseful drama is based on a play by Ariel Dorfman, who also cowrote the screenplay. The movie takes place in an unspecified South American country after the recent fall of the dictatorship. Paulina Escobar (Sigourney Weaver) is a former political activist and torture... Roman Polanski's suspenseful drama is based on a play by Ariel Dorfman, who also cowrote the screenplay. The movie takes place in an unspecified South American country after the recent fall of the dictatorship. Paulina Escobar (Sigourney Weaver) is a former political activist and torture victim. Her husband, Gerardo (Stuart Wilson), a respected lawyer, has just been appointed to head a commission on human rights violations under the old regime, though Paulina, suffering from severe psychological trauma ever since her arrest, objects to what she perceives as a sham investigation. The couple receives an unexpected visitor one stormy night when an affable stranger, Dr. Miranda (Ben Kingsley), drops Gerardo off at the Escobars' isolated house after his car breaks down. Paulina believes she recognizes the man's voice as belonging to the doctor who supervised her torture and raped her on several occasions while she was blindfolded and strapped to a table. In spite of her husband's objections, she decides to take Miranda prisoner, threatening him with a gun, determined to get a taped confession from him at any cost. Under Polanski's keen direction, Dorfman's three-character play is successfully transformed into a captivating film that loses neither dramatic tension nor momentum along the way. [More]