A well-known fundamental rule of screenwriting. Show, do not tell. A huge exception to this rule is one of the 2022 Academy Award-nominated movies for best picture, "Women Talking". This movie is almost entirely about dialogue, women talking about the same thing in a group or with each other. Within an Amish community, some women are being abused by men in their group. This entire story is about the women planning to leave this community and go somewhere else. Exactly where they plan to go, is not fully defined, but the phenomenon of this film is how little it is about and yet the screenwriter found a way to drag this on for a full two hours. The other phenomenon that a movie this boring and about almost nothing is one of the 10 Academy Award-nominated films for 2022.
The acting is solid throughout, with some very relevant women actors including Rooney Mara, Claire Foy, Frances McDormand and Judith Ivey. All of them were able to read the script, then stay awake, and then decided to make this movie. This movie might just have more dialogue than any film ever made. Yes this is a new idea, a different perspective for movie making but for an audience, this can be difficult to sit through.
The Rotten Tomatoes rating of 90% is understandable for the effective acting, but for the overall movie-going experience, I give this one a 70% and recommend this one only for the most die-hard fans of the actors involved, not for the overly long and too boring story.
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