Critic Rating
(read reviews)User Rating
Director
Marina de Van
Cast
Marina de Van,
Laurent Lucas,
Léa Drucker,
Thibault de Montalembert,
Dominique Reymond,
Bernard Alane
Genre
Drama,
Horror
Esther is an ambitious 30-year-old woman. One fateful night at a party, she seriously hurts her leg, however can't seem to feel the pain. This incident propels her toward the start of a self-destructive compulsion, and an exploration of a professional woman's descent into increasingly disturbing and obsessive acts of self-mutilation.
We hate to say it, but we can't find anywhere to view this film.
Village Voice by Dennis Lim
Without deploying reductive backstory or simplistic psychology, this fearless movie -- easily the year's best debut feature -- illuminates Esther's pathology as an extreme response to the mind-body split.
The New York Times by Stephen Holden
As unrelenting an exploration of isolation and dissociation as Roman Polanski's "Repulsion."
Variety by David Rooney
Delves far more deeply into grisly physical manifestation than psychological motivation, making it seem something of an actorish vanity piece. But the drama is directed with arresting spareness and control.
The A.V. Club by Scott Tobias
Makes heavy demands of even jaded viewers, who are unlikely to stomach de Van's anatomical noodling from the same curious distance. But for the brave, the film's literal journey to find the "I" inside the body moves forward with a riveting single-mindedness.
New York Post by V.A. Musetto
Needless to say, In My Skin isn't for everybody. It's recommended to viewers who, like Esther, want to feel something, no matter how distasteful.
Christian Science Monitor by David Sterritt
The results are unsparingly perverse and oddly spellbinding.
L.A. Weekly by Scott Foundas
The movie surely owes something to Polanski, Cronenberg, et al., in its use of an apparently placid, upper-middle-class setting as the background for perverse horrors, but De Van's fearless, high-wire performance is uniquely its own.
Entertainment Weekly by Owen Gleiberman
An experience you won't easily shake.
New York Daily News by Jami Bernard
Even aside from the metaphorical aspect, this may be the first movie to give a precise sense of what drives people who self-mutilate.
Los Angeles Times by Manohla Dargis
Spectacularly grotesque and literally nauseating, even for this usually intrepid moviegoer, In My Skin is among the more disturbing films in this blood-drenched cinematic season.
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