Everly [Blu-ray]

Everly, as a Jungian dreamBy way of background, I am a psychologist who started his career reading Carl Jung, and I believe that Jung is the key to understanding much art, especially any mythic story telling. Everly is not just a sexy horror movie, it is a well-made allegory, a dream, an urban nightmare, if you will. Most movies do not immediately make you realize what they are. I can only remember one, Alien, that struck me as a Jungian dream immediately, its characters being so obvious. I had to watch Everly twice to understand what the artists were doing. Salma Hayak is wonderfully intense in this role, which is anything but gratuitously sexual. If anything, it could be said to be gratuitously anti-sexual.Everly is wonderful in the Jungian sense. I believe that Carl Jung’s most useful insight was that in dreams all the characters are elements of the dreamer, whose Self is usually represented by a quartet of characters, a female by three female and one male.Everly is trapped in her home, (usually the symbol of the Self), a sex slave to a diabolical dark monster, but she has recently decided to try to be free. To do so she must kill many terrible men, who inflict many wounds on her body, but, strangely, she seems to only get stronger in the process rather than weaker. She wants to save her daughter and mother, innocent and maternal elements of her Psyche, and her mother dies in the process, and she ultimately slays the dark man by confronting him. In the end, only the child is saved. Perfect Jung, all the way.She wounds the male element of her psyche, (the dead man), who is mostly just an observer as the drama plays out, Everly unnecessarily eliminates the actually benign male element in her psyche quartet, (Mother, daughter, Everly, Dead Man), although he does passively protect her from the attacking dog after he is dead. The attacking whores are additional mercenary instances of what she is fighting which she must confront and eliminate.Everly clearly feels trapped by her own sexuality, and would like to be free from it, but is held hostage by her “family”, her daughter and mother. She cannot be free as long as they exist and are threatened. There is no father in evidence, only the dark, foreign monster who holds her in thrall and the weak male element of her Psyche, the dead man.If it were a patient’s dream, I would suggest it was dreamt by a woman who feels trapped by sexual desires which she feels are humiliating. She wants to be free but cannot be so long as her “family’s” the rest of herself) welfare hangs in the balance. She acts out by destroying all the male perpetrators of her felt humiliation. She thrusts a long sword into her dark man and twists it before cleaving him in half. Wow. This woman really wants to destroy her sexual desires, which are strong. She also tosses a grenade to another symbol of her animal desire, Bonzai the dog, who fetches it thinking it a ball, a slang term for intercourse, of course, and it destroys him.Alas, in the end, Everly, or the dreamer, does not integrate her sexual desires, but “kills” them, which almost kills her as well. Is her “child” saved? We don’t really know. Does Everly even survive?If such a patient were to achieve integration of her psychic elements, she would need to confront and accept the dark man, to tame the dog, to love her monstrous feelings. But Everly says, “you don’t love the way I do” to the dark man. It is the key line of the entire movie. She is referring to maternal love versus sexual lust, but she is not referring to the dark man: she is referring to the split within herself. Maternal love is acceptable, sexual lust is not. The dilemma, of course, is that they depend on each other.Movies are often expressions of common psychological dilemmas: and learning to accept one’s consummatory sexuality is certainly one of the most common, especially in women today.

This is my favorite Salma Hayek movie, full of action and violence.

Bought for my father, he said it was ok.

Salma’s better than ever! Tons of action right from the get-go. Deals with a lot of depravity though so check tw if you’re sensitive to certain topics.

I love this movie. The character's endurance and perseverance was wonderful. It's got so twisted moments, super gorey.

Boredom is the last thing you will have to worry about when watching Salma Hayek's new action gorefest Everly. In fact, if you have a heart condition, you might want to keep the nitro pills within arms reach because this film doesn't give you too many opportunities to get off the edge of your seat.The film opens up with the horrifying screams of a woman being sexually abused. Thankfully, we don't see anything until a traumatized Everly, (Hayek turns in a marvelous performance) stumbles nude, into the bathroom. Physically and psychologically battered, she retrieves a gun and cell phone from inside the toilet tank. Everly attempts to reach out to an undercover cop who promised to help her escape. However, it's not long before the deviants are bellowing at the bathroom door for round two of their debauchery. So traumatized, Everly initially thinks of using the gun to end her life, instead, she surprises the rapists/mobsters killing them all.Sitting in a room full of dead bodies, Everly is contacted by Taiko, the man who abducted her, and who kept her as his personal sex slave. It seems Everly stole a huge sum of money from him and attempted to escape, which led to his turning her over to his wretched men to use for their pleasure, and eventually kill. He quickly lets her know that she is all alone, as evident by the gift wrapped head of the cop who was supposed to help her escape. With death inescapable, Everly channels her fright and trauma into a single focus. She must stay alive long enough to get the money into the hands of her mother, who has been caring for her young daughter (the ridiculously adorable Aisha Ayamah) since her abduction.The Petite Salma Hayek stands tall beside the male action heroes of the past, Schwarzenegger, Willis, and Stallone, as she manages to accumulate a pretty impressive body count. Besides the five rapists, she sends at least another twenty mobsters, hooker assassins and sadistic sickos to meet their maker before the inevitable confrontation with Taiko (played with creepy effectiveness by Hiroyuki Watanabe). Hayek has all of the charisma to pull off such a film without it seeming campy or stretching the realm of believability too far. Her natural sex appeal is an added treat for male fans, something that I found lacking in other female oriented action films such as Kill Bill and Resident Evil.The film's cinematography (courtesy of DP Steve Gainer) is as breathtaking as Ms. Hayek. Director Joe Lynch, in his first turn with a major budget and star, offers up a film at neck break speed, pausing only long enough for Hayek's personality to shine through. Lynch also benefits from the expert hand of veteran editor Evan Schiff (Pan's Labyrinth, A.I. Artificial Intelligence) who effectively maintains the story below the non-stop action.

Es un torrente de acción desde el principio.

Film tosto che fa pensare. Non è soltanto uno splatter erotico e claustrofobico gratuito, ma mette a fuoco, pur nella sua iperbole, una condizione femminile nella nostra società che sta venendo a galla, e rende questa pellicola quasi precorritrice per molti versi. L'edizione è ineccepibile.

Allora in verita' il film e' da tre stelle, pero' ne do' quattro solo perche' la protagonista e' la mia SALMA, che e' strepitosa e molto sexy. Only for you Salma.

En esta película nos encontramos con Salma Hayek, Everly, dándole estopa a prostitutas, mafiosos, y todo lo que se pone por delante. Sangre, acción, violéncia, humor negro...vaya, película tipo Tarantino, para entendernos...

Excelente servicio todo perfecto.