My take on this movie is not that of an Atwood fan. I never read the book. As to the movie, I missed the first part of it, but, unlike others, had no trouble following the plot. I liked the twists and turns.Zenia is a total user; so resentful of the "happy" lives of others that she enters a life, like that of Roz or Tony or Charis, and takes over an aspect: husband, child, or career. If it doesn't work for her she moves on leaving a mess behind. Along the way she makes herself unforgettable but unforgivable, apparently not. Here comes in the notion that the three women friends, for various reasons, will help Zenia despite her actions. As Zenia puts it she helped Roz's business, Charis' daughter, and Tony's career which flourished when her husband was lured away by Zenia. Why not help her, after all Zenia was the potential victim of a violent boyfriend who threatened murder and Zenia gave him a taste of the punishment had he actually killed her (though he never learns she is alive until she actually isn't.) Pretty cool idea.I really liked Shawn Doyle in the role of ex-cop John working to clear the accused boyfriend-cop, Henry. You're sure he is too strong to be over-powered by Zenia until he meets her. Then, he too nearly becomes a victim. But, in the end they all get their revenge. Roz asks: "Are we like her?" John's reply: "No, we're good." They became the only people who could stop her wickedness without adding John to her list of victims. Not perfect, (What movie is?) but I enjoyed it.

The first thought that came into this viewer's mind was to question Ms. Parker on her choice of vehicles. After having seen her in the New York stage in the brilliant "Dead Man Cell Phone", one can't only guess it was a project that looked good in the written page and it turned out to be a different thing when it started shooting.Granted, Margaret Atwood's novel is not exactly the easiest thing to adapt for the big screen, or even television, as it's the case with this ill conceived idea. Our only suggestion to this talented actress is to stay in New York where she seems to have a knack for choosing plays in which to shine, as she has proved with "How I Learned to Drive" and "Proof", just to mention two other plays in which she shone.While this is not a horrible film, by any means, the people behind it seem to have not get the essence of Ms. Atwood's work by the way it's presented. Better luck next time.

I have not read Margaret Atwood's book, and after seeing this film I initially did not want to. However, I then looked up reviews and synopses of The Robber Bride, which made the novel sound infinitely more interesting than this wretched film. This adaptation is so heavy-handed and moronic that it almost makes something like Basic Instinct stand up as a paragon of subtlety and imagination. The characters are almost uniformly unlikeable, but they're not even unlikeable in any kind of interesting way! And all of them behave like complete idiots. From synopses of Atwood's novel, it would appear that the frame story in this film (that of a crime/murder investigation) doesn't even exist in the book. If that's the case, then frankly, I think Atwood should sue over this travesty. I hope, at the very least, she got a hefty paycheque. That might make up for a lot. Don't waste your valuable time on this mind-numbing excuse for cinema. Really, really, really badly written and directed. Where's Atwood's sarcasm? Her sense of humour? Her sly wit?? Lost in bad writing and bad directing. I can't even blame the actors. They're doing their best with some outrageously bad material. Speaking of actors, MUST every film made in Canada star the same subgroup of thespians? Seriously? There's a lot of untapped talent out there. Imagine if Nicole Kidman starred in 90% of the films that came out of the U.S. How believable would you find her in anything, then? Wouldn't it make you tired? But I digress. Avoid the film version of The Robber Bride at all costs. Go read the real thing instead.

Margaret Atwood novels have not fared well as movies because she is far more interested in ideas than stories. The Handmaid's Tale had such powerful ideas it wasn't surprising the movie version disappointed. I'm not sure if Atwood was trying to write a comic novel when she wrote Robber Bride or trying to get as close as she could to a mystery novel. As with so many of her efforts, she wasn't successful at either, but the quality of her work makes reading her worthwhile anyway. CBC was pretty daring even to try to turn the novel into a TV movie. They chose the easy way out and turned it into a comic thriller. It works as well as other comic thrillers, better than the recent CTV adaptations of detective novels. It is the acting by Mary-Louise Parker, Amanda Root and others which earned it an above-average rating for me. Maybe with more money they could have turned it into a good cinema film.