Salma Hayek in Everly (Radius-TWC)

Rarely does a film leaving you feeling as icky as Everly. It’s misogynist, xenophobic, sexist, violent, and extraordinarily dull. The filmmakers have one good idea: a woman tries to leave her apartment as a horde of bad guys (and girls) are hounding her in every direction. One salivates at the idea of what Robert Rodriguez or Quentin Tarantino would make of this, and you will keep on salivating because director Joe Lynch and writer Yale Hannon don’t have the chops to pull any of this off.

The whole thing starts off with a gang rape and heads downhill from there. You see Everly (Salma Hayek—why, Salma, why?!?!?—plays the title character) was kidnapped and forced to be a high-end call girl for the sadistic gang leader Taiko (Hiroyuki Watanabe). He has made her do awful things. In the meantime, Everly has had no contact with her daughter and mother, who is raising the girl. Apparently gang rape is the straw that breaks the camel’s back, and Everly retaliates and kills all the perpetrators. She then gets a call from Taiko saying he’s going after her family. So, Everly prepares to leave to save them, but cannot as waves of assassins of all types (hookers, yakuza, weird torture dudes, a Doberman) swarm into place over the next hour and a half or so.

Those expecting action and gore will find it. Those expecting to enjoy the action and gore will not. The film is awash in exploitation masquerading as feminism. Sure, Salma eventually kicks some serious ass. But a clue for filmmakers: After your main character is gang raped, it’s not okay for the camera to lovingly ogle her as she’s showering. It’s creepy and gross. And you want to tread lightly when you decide to put a kid in danger. And there’s no light treading here. The emotional manipulation is so blatant it makes Patch Adams seem like The English Patient.

When making a film like this, tone is important. You want to sympathize with the main character. You want to be titillated, but you also want to be respected in the morning. Even the really trashy exploitation films of the ’70’s understood that. The nihilism here is just rampant, and there’s no depth to it. Or point. It’s just to watch a woman get violated and horribly abused, but hey, she fights back and kills some people and looks hot doing it.

And the dialogue. Oh, the dialogue. It’s what film students come up with on their first draft and then smack their head with their hand when reading it and start over. Poor Salma. There’s nothing she or the other actors can do with this stuff.

I would call this a two-shower as opposed to a two-star film. Because you will need to do so to feel clean again after seeing it.