A group of women in an isolated religious colony struggle to reconcile their faith with a series of sexual assaults committed by the colony's men.
Ratings
Curator score: 6.9/10
IMDb: 6.9/10
Letterboxd: 3.80/5
Rotten Tomatoes: 90%
Metacritic: 77
TMDB: 6.8/10
Director
Sarah Polley
Production
Plan B Entertainment, Hear/Say Productions, Orion Pictures
Cast
Rooney Mara, Claire Foy, Jessie Buckley, Judith Ivey, Ben Whishaw, Sheila McCarthy, Kate Hallett, Michelle McLeod, Liv McNeil, August Winter, Frances McDormand, Emily Mitchell, Kira Guloien, Shayla Brown, Eli Ham, Lochlan Ray Miller, Vivien Endicott Douglas, Nathaniel McParland, Marcus Craig, Will Bowes
Curator Review
Verdict
A severe, dialogue-driven chamber drama that turns a horrifying premise into a searching debate about faith, justice, forgiveness, and self-determination. It’s especially rewarding if you value ensemble acting, moral complexity, and films that treat conversation as action.
Best for
Viewers who like intense ensemble dramas
Fans of moral and political debate on screen
Audiences drawn to faith-based stories with a critical edge
People who appreciate restrained, performance-first filmmaking
Viewers interested in women-centered narratives about collective decision-making
Skip if
You want graphic depiction or procedural thriller pacing
You prefer plot-heavy films with lots of external action
You dislike stagey, dialogue-forward chamber pieces
You want a more emotionally cathartic or conventionally uplifting ending
You are sensitive to sexual violence as an offscreen subject
Overview
Women Talking is built like a pressure cooker: a single room, a single crisis, and a series of arguments that gradually become a blueprint for survival. Sarah Polley keeps the focus on process rather than spectacle, letting the women’s competing instincts—leave, stay and fight, forgive, protect the children, preserve the faith—collide with real force. The result is austere but never inert, anchored by a cast that understands every pause as a form of resistance.
Worth noting
What gives the film its power is not just its politics, but its refusal to simplify the women into one correct position. It’s about language failing, then being rebuilt; about what it means to imagine a future when the present has been organized around fear. The film can feel deliberately controlled, even mannered, and some viewers may find the visual palette too muted, but the emotional and ethical stakes are unmistakable.
Bottom line
This is a serious, adult drama that asks for patience and attention, and it pays that back with uncommon clarity. If you respond to films where ideas are dramatized through performance and collective argument, it’s one of the year’s most substantial works. If you need momentum, suspense, or visceral release, it may feel more like a thesis than a story.
Top Letterboxd reviews
Amanda the Jedi (4★) · 8343 likes
Women do indeed talk
Highlight of the experience was the woman next to me waking up her husband with ‘women talking means men listening’
Zach Shevich (4.5★) · 5306 likes
Twelve Angry Women
James (Schaffrillas) (4★) · 4192 likes
Great movie but why is the color grading like that. Like I get what they're going for but you can make a movie look bleak without making it look like an antidepressants commercial
Jay (4★) · 3772 likes
decision to leave
Olivia Craighead (3.5★) · 3522 likes
pretty funny that someone literally says “not all men”