KEPT WOMAN: DTMWaGL #26
Lot of pictures in this one sorry
Hello friends! At this point in my Life Events, I just want comfort food. Something nice and warm and soft and comforting. Something squishy. Something like KEPT WOMAN, a movie about a man who abducts mouthy women and imprisons them in his 1950s time capsule basement, where he forces them to be his perfect housewives. Enjoy! (Content warnings for, whew, a lot, seriously: kidnapping, rape, coercion, gaslighting, and murder.)
Meet Evan and Jessica! They’re engaged! They’re a perfect couple, except for how he is a cardboard cutout of a person who constantly undermines her. After their apartment in NYC was robbed by a guy with a gun, and after Evan’s cop friend Tyler told them that it was useless to expect to get their stuff back, they abruptly move to the suburbs. The suburbs! Where everything is safe and nothing is interesting. As they move boxes, they chat about how they hope they can afford this. Evan has A Job In The City, Doing Something Where He Wears A Tie, and Jess is a graphic designer, who works from home and can take on more projects. Plus, she adds, they’ll save money by not having their stuff stolen. Ha ha! Get insurance.
On the first night in their new house, Jess and Evan get a visitor: their next door neighbor Simon. He is wearing an absolutely incredible outfit and bearing wine. Wearing and bearing, that’s Simon. He shakes Evan’s hand and kisses Jess’s, like a real weirdo, and then tells them that he’s a professor of men’s studies at the local university. Jess laughs at this, and says “I didn’t think there was that much to know on the subject. Ha ha, ha?” because Jess is a cool modern women and the idea of “men’s studies” is ridiculous. Simon excuses himself to grade papers, and Evan scolds Jess for sassing the neighbor. Men’s studies! Come on.
The next morning, Evan leaves for Work in the City and Jess settles into her desk to work on a graphic design project. Graphic designer is absolutely one of the jobs Lifetime movie women are allowed to have! Before she can really get rolling, she gets a video call from her friend Oscar. Oscar lives in a giant weird warehouse-y apartment and he is played by the guy who played Sheldon in Canadian family dramedy “Less Than Kind,” a show I enjoyed very much. It was set in Winnipeg and it used the Weakerthans song about hating Winnipeg as the theme. Jess tries to tell Oscar she has a ton of work to do, but Oscar has some information about a missing person. They’re internet detectives! They never solve anything, but their real reward is the friends they make along the way. Jess accidentally spends all day chatting with Oscar, and when her fiance arrives home, he gets pissy at her for spending all day chatting with some guy while he’s out making the mortgage payments. And then he makes a stir fry but you can just tell it’s gonna be all gristle.
Jess gets back to work in the morning, but only until she sees Simon pulling out of his driveway in a stubby little car from the fifties. She flags him down to thank him for the wine, asking if he has a cellar, because the bottle was dusty. “You’re very perceptive,” he muses. She is! And she isn’t, because she apologizes for the cracks about men’s studies (which are fake) and invites him over for dinner.
So Simon comes next door for dinner and brings more delicious wine, which pairs really well with the random meats that Evan is grilling. When Jess brings a salad out, he stares and stares and stares at her. She does look nice, and she also tells Simon that Evan does most of the cooking around here. Evan protests that Jess does make a mean rhubarb pie, but only when he deserves it. Which he does not. Simon doesn’t really cook either, since his mom threatened to stab anyone who tried to help her in the kitchen. Okay cool, and then you reached adulthood, so? He also reveals that he had a fiancee who left him, but it’s fine because “I’m SURE she’s VERY HAPPY with the guy she was CHEATING ON ME WITH.” He teaches this in his lectures. It will be on the quiz. Evan tries to change the subject by talking up Jess’s websleuthing and her vague desire to write a book someday. Yeah, me too. That night, Evan and Jess flirt-argue about her being possessive, and the time she put lipstick on the collars of all the shirts in his closet (I don’t understand this gambit, please explain it to me), and then they make out while Simon watches them from next door.
Jess has apparently given up on trying to work at all, and is struggling to do some gardening with a hand trowel the next morning. She flags down Simon, who is pulling into his driveway with a car full of groceries, and asks him if he has a shovel and also is he seeing someone? That’s a lot of food for one person. Simon replies that his shovel is broken, just a real broken shovel, and that he um. He. He hates shopping! Yeah, that’s the ticket, he really stocked up because he hates shopping. That night, Jess tells Evan that something is off about Simon. Maybe he’s having an affair with one of his students? Evan tells her that this whole moving thing was to make her feel safe, and if she’s going to make everything into one of her little mysteries, she’s never going to feel safe. Anyway shut up, Simon’s at the door now! He just remembered: he does have a shovel, but he also has an early class, here you go byeeeee. Evan snipes at Jess that “there is something off about him, he’s nice,” and goes to sleep on the couch. Why didn’t moving to the suburbs solve all their problems? I thought for sure it would.
Jess wakes up to an empty house and decides to go snoop on Simon a little, peering in the windows of his quiet house. She goes home and calls Oscar to fill him in on her weird neighbor, but Oscar tells her she has literally nothing to go on. She has her intuition okay, Oscar. He agrees to do some poking around, because Oscar is a good friend. Later that day (??) Simon pours himself brandy and reviews the footage from the many security cameras he has placed around the house, and watches Jess ringing his doorbell and peeking in his windows. He calls Jess to lure her over with the promise of a gift, and Jess is working on the world’s most elastic deadline so she agrees. Turns out Simon bought her a dress, a full-skirted sleeveless thing that could have come from ModCloth. Jess nervously says she can’t accept that, because it is extremely weird for your next door neighbor to buy you a dress. Simon tells her that he knew she wanted to be there, with him, when he saw her ringing his doorbell, and when she turns to yikes out of this situation, he holds a chloroform-soaked rag over her face. People in Lifetime movies have really easy access to chloroform! What is it even for, other than gassing people? Who knows. I don’t need that in my search history.
This time when Jess wakes up, she’s not in an empty house, but in a living room straight out of 1955. Boy they just don’t make TVs like they used to. (This one seems to only show the security camera feeds from around the house, though.) And she’s not alone, there’s another woman there. Her name is Robin, and she pleasantly tells Jess two things: 1) she’s home now, and 2) she can’t get out, the door is locked with a code and soundproof, please stop yelling, it only makes Simon angry. Jess breaks a window and then realizes that the windows do not open to the outside, but rather to a concrete wall, with fluorescent lights providing the “sunlight.” She’s in Simon’s basement, oh no.
While Jess sorts out her situation, Simon is prowling around her house, packing a suitcase with some of her clothes and also punching the glass in a framed photo of Evan and Jess before tossing it in the garbage. When he returns to his basement, he informs “Jessica” that she’ll have to clean up all the things she broke. This will all go easier for her if she simply accepts this as her lot in life. When he sees Jess eyeing the kitchen knives, he smugly informs her that sure, she can kill him, and “die down here like an Egyptian with her pharaoh”, and if she tries and fails to kill him, well that’s even worse, isn’t that right, Robin? Robin smiles tightly and nods. Jess notices that Simon brought her suitcase, and he explains that well, she packed that when she left Evan. Evan is currently walking around his house, calling Jess to apologize for arguing with her last night, and realizing that while his fiancee isn’t there, her phone and her laptop are. “Hmm,” thinks Evan, insofar as Evan is allowed to have thoughts.
While Robin prepares dinner, Jess asks how she got to the basement. Robin cheerfully explains that just like her, Simon chose her, except unlike her, he was her professor. Yucko. Robin tried to leave, when she got to the basement (a few years ago) (she thinks), but then she realized that Simon loves her and this is where she’s meant to be. Simon arrives for dinner, bearing gifts for Jess: some new dresses, and a typewriter, to support her creative ambitions. Isn’t that sweet! She can finally write that book, now that she’s not out in the horrible real world, full of “lost, weak men, and overburdened women.” Okay! Cutting out the subtext right off the bat. I love Lifetime movies. Did you know that I love Lifetime movies?
Before Robin can serve the roast, Evan rings the doorbell, and Simon goes upstairs to tell him that no, he hasn’t seen Jessica, but he did talk to her on the phone and she seemed a little upset. Evan still thinks it’s weird that she didn’t take her phone, and I think it’s weird that Simon didn’t think to take her phone, but Evan leaves. Robin and Jess have been watching this exchange, and Robin tells her that that part of her life is over now. It’s been like six hours, can’t you just give in? Evan goes home and only now sees the couples photo in the garbage, but the fact that she didn’t take her phone or her toothbrush is still eating away at him, so he calls his cop friend Tyler. Tyler reminds him that he and Jess had been fighting, but suggests that maybe that Oscar guy she’s always talking to might know something. Or maybe she ran off with him! Let’s find out.
Evan and Tyler, who has the neckless body typical of the cop, show up at Oscar’s fluorescent apartment to tell him Jess is missing, and ask if he knows anything. A thing I love about this movie is that Evan is a slender, nice-looking man who works out and wears ties and slacks, and Oscar is a fat guy who lives in a weird concrete box and only wears basketball shorts, and Oscar is presented as a legitimate romantic rival for Jess’s affections. He’s funny and charming and he shares her interests! Why wouldn’t he be? Oscar invites them in and tells them he doesn’t know where Jess would have gone, but he did mention that she and Evan had been fighting, and that she thought their neighbor was weird. Tyler gives Oscar his card and Oscar tells him he’ll dig up anything he can on Simon, and what is implied but not stated is, “because we all know the real cops are dogshit at this.”
Tyler and Evan drop in on Simon, and Tyler brings up all the groceries Jess saw him with. Simon says that ah, yes, he did purchase a lot of food at “the grocery mart” (???) because you caught me, I was having a dinner guest. It was one of his grad students, so he was trying to be discreet. After Simon shoos the city boys out of his house, he storms into the basement and demands that Jess hand over her email address and password, so that he can go send Evan an email from her explaining why she left him. When he gets back from the future where they have email, Jess is bullied into doing a resentful fashion show. When she gets up the nerve to tell Simon that he’s insane, he grabs her hand, kisses it, and then twists her arm and forces her to the ground. Then he pets her and it’s extremely gross and he tells her that Robin can help her with her hair and makeup, and she can cook dinner tomorrow. Robin rushes to Jess’s side and tells her that Simon loves them. I wonder what Robin’s interests are. She reminds me of Hailey Baldwin in the Justin Bieber profile that Caity Weaver wrote for GQ, where it seems like Hailey spends all her time sitting perfectly still at the edge of the hotel bed, waiting for Justin to come back.
The next night, Jess makes a roast while wearing full fifties housewife regalia, and Simon brings her a treat. It’s some of those detective stories she loves so much! Those go for between three and twenty dollars a pop on eBay, so you know he really loves her. After Jess compliantly cuts Simon a slice of meat, she swiftly whangs him in the head with a frying pan while Robin screams. Jess ties Simon to a chair but her efforts to torture the door codes out of him are all for naught, as Robin rushes her and chokes her, allowing Simon to get loose. Robin later issues Jess the classic non-apology apology of “listen I’m sorry you can’t find love in your heart for the man who kidnapped and enslaved us but if you can’t pull it together you’re going to end up like Megan.” Who’s Megan? Well, Megan was Robin before Robin was Robin, except that she couldn’t do the love heart thing. Did Simon kill her? No. Robin did, as punishment for not trying hard enough to stop her escape attempts. So Robin has a stake in remaining an underground housewife.
In the morning, Simon invites Evan over to have a drink and watch “the ballgame” (just like a normal man), so that night they sit around and drink beers and watch baseball. Did I spend several seconds with the movie paused, trying to identify the stadium? Yes I did. I miss baseball, I’m sick. Simon tells Evan that he knows just how he feels, because his “fiancee” “left him.” Hey, isn’t being a shriveled bitter husk of a man great? Isn’t it fuckin dope as hell to be furious at all women, everywhere? Hell yeah dude, up top. Jess watches them on the security cameras and bangs a broom on the ceiling but obviously Evan can’t hear them. Even if he could, it’s not like Jess has a distinctive broom sound. I would just assume it was something lumpy in the dryer. After Evan leaves, Simon returns to the basement and informs Jess that if she tries to escape again, he’ll murder Evan. She says she’ll be good, and he tells her that to prove it, he has to come to bed with her and it’s extremely gross and this is all intercut with Evan throwing a bunch of Jess’s stuff in the garbage, and Robin feeling some feelings. I’m starting to think that this men’s studies professor has some bad ideas about women!
SIX WEEKS LATER: Evan has put the house up for sale. He’s going back to the city, where girlfriends never leave you and everyone is safe. While he and Simon chat about that, Robin pissily informs Jess that last night was supposed to be her night with Simon, and don’t act like you aren’t flirting with him. Jess tells her to fuck off, but Simon does allow her to carve the ham that night. Ladies, you know it’s for real when he lets you carve the ham. That night, Robin gets her precious night with Simon and uses it to tell him that Jess doesn’t really love him, she said so, she told Robin everything. Girls: they can’t keep their pretty mouths shut Simon announces that he’s going to address this, and drags Jess out of bed. He repeats what Robin told him, which Jess denies, and then he proclaims that LYING is a CANCER in families, and what do you do with cancers? Chemotherapy? Radiation? That laser knife thing they advertise during baseball games? Yes, the laser knife: you cut it out! With this, he swiftly cuts Robin’s throat, because he knew she was lying. As the head of the household, it was his responsibility to do this, and also to file the taxes and arrange home repairs. As Simon drags Robin’s body out of the living room, he tells Jess to pick out some music, honey, and play it loud, while he cuts up Robin’s corpse. It is fairly intense for a Lifetime movie.
Evan may be moving on from Jess, but Oscar isn’t: he calls Evan’s cop friend Tyler to ask if he’s heard from her, and to pass along some information about Simon. He and his websleuth pals looked at the schools where he’s taught, and there’s at least one missing woman during his tenure at each one. Plus, he was asked to resign from his last job for having “inappropriate contact” with the missing woman there. Tyler necklessly thinks, “am I really bad at my job? No, definitely not,” while Oscar tells him that Simon was questioned in the woman’s disappearance but never charged, and offers to send him the documents he found.
Jess and Simon are quietly snuggling on the couch when Tyler returns to Simon’s house to ask him some more questions. He also observes that Simon sure does have a lot of room for someone who lives alone. Several people in this movie say this, but it’s not the point the movie thinks it is, because the other members of the household live in the dang basement. Also, does he construct this same basement everywhere he moves? With the false walls and windows and double metal doors with codes? It seems like a…lot of work and his professor hands are so delicate. This must be some sort of traveling Winchester house situation, or maybe he just gets really lucky on Zillow. While they walk around Simon’s house, Tyler muses aloud about that grad student in Hartford (Robin) and the other one, Megan? Megan Carswell? Does this ring any bells with you, Simon? Tyler’s onto something and he knows it but before he can finish telling Simon that the problem with guys like him is that they think they know everything, he takes a blow to the back of the head and that’s it for Tyler. The only cop in this movie is dead now. When Simon returns to the basement, Jess placidly tells him that it’s fine that he killed Tyler; he was protecting them. Simon hopes she really means that.
Evan’s house sold! Simon walks over to check in on him and hey have you heard anything about your friend’s murder? Any clues? It is incomprehensible that they haven’t been able to trace it to Simon! Even if Tyler’s phone’s location tracking wasn’t on, you could check his phone records, see that his last call was from Oscar, ask Oscar what that call was about, and figure it out. But this has not happened! Anyway, Simon realizes he has an opportunity to make Jess prove that her love and desire to live in his basement, so that night he invites her upstairs, to look out the window at her old house. Jess is sad that Evan couldn’t be happy here, and she just wishes there was something they could do for him. Simon suggests bringing him a bottle of wine, again, and Jess proudly says that’s perfect and hugs him. Back to the basement for her now, so that Simon can bring Evan that bottle of wine. During their brief farewell chat, Evan notices that there’s lipstick on Simon’s collar. Evan knows a thing! Oh hell yeah it’s on.
In Evan’s last morning in the suburbs, he gets a call from Oscar, who just heard about Tyler’s murder. He offers his condolences and the information that he had just called him about Simon. Evan knows two things! Meanwhile, Jess tells Simon she’d like to bake him a rhubarb pie. He’s pie-worthy, a great honor among her people.
Jess bakes the pie and insists that they eat it on the floor, with their hands, like it’s a picnic. Simon agrees because men will do anything for a pretty face and a good pie. They’re interrupted when an alarm goes off upstairs: Evan is inside the house! He’s looking around and yelling for Jess, but Simon says they can just wait him out. No they can’t, because he knows Jess is in there: he smells rhubarb pie. Consider what aroma would alert your partner that you’re trapped in a house. Chocolate chip cookies? Fried fish? Weed? “You lying bitch, you did this on purpose,” Simon snarls at Jess, and runs upstairs. Jess rushes to the keypad for the door and tries to guess the code based on which numbers are sticky with rhubarb pie filling while also keeping an eye on the fight between Evan and Simon that’s unfolding on the ancient console TV. Three channels on this thing and all that’s on is slender white men fighting, can you believe it? Simon is getting the better of Evan until Jess, fresh up from the basement, clobbers him with a fire extinguisher. Thank goodness.
ONE YEAR LATER, and oh what a year it was, Evan kisses Jess goodbye as she gets into a cab to visit Simon in prison. He thanks her for speaking against the death penalty in his case, and she tells him that that wasn’t a favor, that was so that he’d be imprisoned for as long as possible. She also wants him to know that he never broke her, and that no matter what he thinks about women, she outsmarted him. And then she gestures to the prison guard, who hands Simon a paperback, copy of international bestseller Kept Women, by Jessica Crowder. It’s inscribed “Simon, this is your fate, accept it. Jess.”
So in the past year:
Jess and Evan moved back to the city.
Jess and Evan got married.
Jess wrote an entire book and got it published, under her married name, in such a timely manner that the copy she has is a paperback printing that says “international bestseller” on it.
Simon’s trial, a complex multi-state affair, and penalty phase occurred. Maybe he pled guilty? That would shorten the timeline for sure. He doesn’t seem like he would, though.
What a year!! What a movie. Thank you for reading, please please please share the newsletter with someone who you think might like it.
Extremely scary!