The Headless Woman (2008 Film)
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''The Headless Woman'' ( es, La mujer sin cabeza / La mujer rubia) is a 2008 Argentine
psychological thriller Psychological thriller is a genre combining the thriller and psychological fiction genres. It is commonly used to describe literature or films that deal with psychological narratives in a thriller or thrilling setting. In terms of context and co ...
art film An art film (or arthouse film) is typically an independent film, aimed at a niche market rather than a mass market audience. It is "intended to be a serious, artistic work, often experimental and not designed for mass appeal", "made primarily f ...
written and directed by
Lucrecia Martel Lucrecia Martel (born December 14, 1966) is an Argentine film director, screenwriter and producer whose feature films have frequented Cannes, Venice, Berlin, Toronto, and many other international film festivals. Film scholar Paul Julian Smith w ...
and starring
María Onetto María Onetto (18 August 1966 – 2 March 2023) was an Argentine theatre, film, and television actress. She received the a 2011 Konex Award in entertainment for her theatrical work, and is also well known for her role in the 2006 Argentine TV se ...
. The plot revolves around Vero (short for Verónica) (Onetto), who hits something while driving on a deserted road near
Salta Salta () is the capital and largest city in the Argentine province of the same name. With a population of 618,375 according to the 2010 census, it is also the 7th most-populous city in Argentina. The city serves as the cultural and economic ce ...
. Not being sure if she has hit a person or an animal, she drives off, and becomes increasingly mentally disturbed. The film premiered in competition at the 2008 Cannes Film Festival on May 21, 2008. It opened nationwide on August 21, 2008, after being screened at the
Locarno International Film Festival The Locarno Film Festival is an annual film festival, held every August in Locarno, Switzerland. Founded in 1946, the festival screens films in various competitive and non-competitive sections, including feature-length narrative, documentary, sh ...
earlier that month. While ''The Headless Woman'' was mostly lauded by critics for its cinematography and
social commentary Social commentary is the act of using rhetorical means to provide commentary on social, cultural, political, or economic issues in a society. This is often done with the idea of implementing or promoting change by informing the general populace ab ...
, others were critical towards the film's slow pace and lack of clear narrative. In 2016, the film was ranked No. 89th on
BBC #REDIRECT BBC #REDIRECT BBC Here i going to introduce about the best teacher of my life b BALAJI sir. He is the precious gift that I got befor 2yrs . How has helped and thought all the concept and made my success in the 10th board exam. ...
...
's list of the 100 greatest films of the 21st century. In 2022, it was selected as the 24th greatest film of Argentine cinema in a poll organized in 2022 by the specialized magazines ''La vida útil'', ''Taipei'' and ''La tierra quema'', which was presented at the
Mar del Plata International Film Festival The Mar del Plata International Film Festival ( es, Festival Internacional de Cine de Mar del Plata) is an international film festival that takes place every November in the city of Mar del Plata, Argentina. It is the only competitive feature fest ...
.


Plot

This film is centered around Verónica ("Vero"), an Argentinean bourgeois woman, and how her life slowly twists out of control after she thinks perhaps she struck and killed a person with her car. As Vero is driving, she is distracted by her cell phone and, as she looks down to answer it, her car hits something. She peers in the rear-view mirror, collects herself, and drives away. A non-point-of-view shot of Véro driving away from the scene shows a dog lying dead on the ground. Although Vero seems indifferent about the situation, it is clear that the incident deeply disturbs her. She acts clumsy and out of place. When she informs her husband Marcos that she thinks she may have run over someone, she insists upon returning to the scene of the accident; they see something on the side of the road, which her husband insists is merely a dog, though Vero is even more unsure than before. Later, the body of a dark-skinned servant's child is recovered from a canal, right above the spot where the accident occurred. Her niece Candita, who has a crush on Vero, tells her that she wants to know more about "that boy who was murdered," but Vero insists that the boy was drowned: "The papers say he was drowned." Still privately unconvinced, in an attempt to jog back her memory after the accident, Vero revisits a hospital where she had X-rays taken and a hotel where she had a post-accident tryst with her lover Juan Manuel. She discovers that there are no records of her visits to a hospital (perhaps scrubbed by her brother, who works there) and the hotel where she stayed (perhaps scrubbed by Juan Manuel). Finally, she attends a bourgeois party in a hotel, smiling weakly and dazedly as people enter in and out of the busy frame.


Cast

*
María Onetto María Onetto (18 August 1966 – 2 March 2023) was an Argentine theatre, film, and television actress. She received the a 2011 Konex Award in entertainment for her theatrical work, and is also well known for her role in the 2006 Argentine TV se ...
as Verónica ("Vero") * Claudia Cantero as Josefina * César Bordón as Marcos * Daniel Genoud as Juan Manuel * Guillermo Arengo as Marcelo *
Inés Efron Inés Efron (born May 9, 1984 in Mexico City) is an Argentine actress. Career Before ''XXY'', Inés Efron starred in ''Glue'', a drama about three teenagers set in a small town in a remote town in Uruguay. In her '' XXY'' role, Efron's charact ...
as Candita * Alicia Muxo as Prima Rosita * Pía Uribelarrea as Prima Tere *
María Vaner María Vaner (23 March 1935 – 21 July 2008) was an Argentine actress. She appeared in nearly 50 films and television shows between 1958 and 2008. The daughter of Pedro Aleandro, her sister was actress Norma Aleandro. She had two sons with ...
as Tía Lala


Reception


Critical response

''The Headless Woman'' garnered mostly positive reviews from film critics. On
review aggregator A review aggregator is a system that collects reviews of products and services (such as films, books, video games, software, hardware, and cars). This system stores the reviews and uses them for purposes such as supporting a website where users ...
website
Rotten Tomatoes Rotten Tomatoes is an American review-aggregation website for film and television. The company was launched in August 1998 by three undergraduate students at the University of California, Berkeley: Senh Duong, Patrick Y. Lee, and Stephen Wang ...
, the film holds a 75% approval rating based on 52 reviews, with a rating average of 6.89 out of 10. The site's consensus states: "Careful and slight, Lucretia Martel's ''Headless Woman'' doesn't fit neatly into a clear storyline, but supports itself with ethereal visuals." At
Metacritic Metacritic is a website that review aggregator, aggregates reviews of films, TV shows, music albums, video games and formerly, books. For each product, the scores from each review are averaged (a weighted arithmetic mean, weighted average). M ...
, which assigns a weighted mean rating out of 0–100 reviews from film critics, the film has a score of 81 based on 12 reviews, classified as a universally acclaimed film.


Accolades

Each year is linked to the article about the awards held that year.


See also

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Mental illness in film This is a non-exhaustive list of films which have portrayed mental disorders. Inclusion in this list is based upon the disorder as it is portrayed in the canon of the film, and does not necessarily reflect the diagnosis or symptoms in the real wor ...


References


Further reading

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External links

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''La mujer sin cabeza''
at LUMIERE * * * * {{DEFAULTSORT:Headless Woman, The 2008 psychological thriller films 2008 films 2008 LGBT-related films Argentine LGBT-related films Argentine mystery thriller films Argentine thriller drama films French psychological thriller films French mystery television series French thriller drama films Italian mystery thriller films Italian thriller drama films Italian psychological thriller films 2000s Spanish-language films Spanish mystery thriller films Spanish thriller drama films Films produced by Agustín Almodóvar Films directed by Lucrecia Martel Focus Features films Warner Bros. films El Deseo films 2000s French films 2000s Spanish films 2000s Italian films 2000s Argentine films Spanish psychological thriller films Argentine psychological thriller films