In the Cut
イン・ザ・カット
Storyline
The whole story, ending included.
A New York English teacher and a detective who may be a killer; Meg Ryan's career detour into explicit desire.
Frannie Avery is a reserved writer who teaches English in New York. Meeting a student, Cornelius, in a bar, she goes down to the basement toilets and in the half-dark glimpses a woman giving a man oral sex. She sees only a three of spades tattooed on his wrist and the woman's blue fingernails. Days later Detective Giovanni Malloy comes to question her: a young woman has been murdered, and her remains have turned up in Frannie's garden.
Malloy is crude and sexually direct, and Frannie is both frightened and thrilled by him. His partner, Richard Rodriguez, has been barred from carrying a gun since threatening to kill his wife. Frannie notices that Malloy has a three-of-spades tattoo. Walking home one night she is attacked by a masked man; she calls Malloy, and they have sex. Afterwards a charm is missing from her bracelet. She tells everything to her free-spirited half-sister, Pauline, who lives above a strip club. When Malloy says the dead woman had been in the same bar that night, Frannie remembers the tattoo and begins to fear him.
A second woman is killed, and Cornelius is questioned. John Graham, an ex-boyfriend who has been stalking Frannie, says he wants to ask Pauline out. Then Frannie finds Pauline murdered in her apartment. That night, drunk, she is almost raped by Cornelius until Rodriguez arrives. Malloy tells her the killer leaves a ring on his victims' fingers, and that he has a key to Pauline's flat. When she asks if he is the killer, he sends her home in anger.
They sleep together again, with Malloy handcuffed to a pipe, and in his jacket she finds her missing charm. Sure now, she leaves him cuffed, takes his jacket and gun, and outside accepts a ride from Rodriguez. He drives her to the little lighthouse under the George Washington Bridge, and she sees on his wrist the same tattoo; the two partners had them done together. Rodriguez holds out a ring on the tip of a knife and asks her to marry him. She shoots him, and when he tries to strangle her, shoots him dead. Bloodied, she walks home and lies down beside Malloy, still cuffed where she left him.
Starring
Meg Ryanas Frannie Avery
A reserved English teacher and writer in Manhattan, drawn into a murder case and into an affair with the detective working it.
Frannie Avery’s story
Frannie opens up to almost no one but her half-sister, Pauline. In a bar basement she glimpses a man with a three-of-spades tattoo on his wrist; days later Detective Malloy tells her a murdered woman's remains have turned up in her garden. His crudeness frightens and excites her. Attacked by a masked man, she calls him, and they have sex; afterwards a charm is missing from her bracelet. When she learns the victim was in the same bar, she remembers his tattoo and begins to fear him. Then she finds Pauline murdered, and that night her student Cornelius tries to rape her until Rodriguez arrives. Finding her charm in Malloy's jacket, she leaves him handcuffed and gets into Rodriguez's car. At the lighthouse she sees the same tattoo, shoots him dead, and walks home to lie down beside Malloy.
Mark Ruffaloas Detective Giovanni Malloy
The homicide detective on the case, crude and sexually direct, whose tattoo makes Frannie fear he is the killer.
Detective Giovanni Malloy’s story
Malloy works homicide with his partner, Rodriguez. Questioning Frannie about the woman whose remains were found in her garden, he comes on to her openly, and tells her his three-of-spades tattoo marks him as a member of a secret club. When she calls him after an attack, they sleep together. He teaches her to shoot by the river. After Pauline's murder he tells her the killer leaves a ring on his victims' fingers, and that he has a key to Pauline's flat; when she asks if he is the killer, he sends her home in anger. They sleep together again, with him handcuffed to a pipe, and she walks out with his jacket and gun. He is still cuffed there when she comes back bloodied from killing Rodriguez, who had the matching tattoo, and lies down beside him.
Jennifer Jason Leighas Pauline Avery
Frannie's free-spirited half-sister, who lives above a strip club and is the one person Frannie confides in.
Nick Damicias Detective Richard Rodriguez
Malloy's partner, barred from carrying a gun after threatening to kill his wife.
Kevin Baconas John Graham
Frannie's former boyfriend, who has been stalking her and now says he wants to date Pauline.
Sharrieff Pughas Cornelius Webb
Frannie's student, fascinated by the serial killer John Wayne Gacy, who falls under police suspicion.
Why it matters
In the Cut is about a woman trying to find out what she wants in a city full of men who might hurt her. Jane Campion takes the erotic thriller, a genre long built around a man's gaze and a dangerous woman, and turns it round: the camera stays with Frannie's desire and her fear, and never quite separates them. Around her are men's crude talk, a stalking ex, a detective's blunt advances, a student who tries to rape her and a killer who proposes marriage. On release it divided critics, and audiences polled by CinemaScore gave it an F; Variety still called Meg Ryan's performance an arresting change of pace. Since then it has been reappraised as a feminist erotic thriller that subverts the male gaze. What it leaves behind is uncomfortable and honest: for many women, wanting a man and being afraid of him are not always separate feelings.