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Muriel (Toni Collette) joins her friends, once the in-crowd from high school, at a local club. Tania (Sophie Lee) has discovered her new husband is having an affair. The others invite Tania to dump him and come on a holiday with them. Muriel doesn’t know about the holiday because they don’t want her to come. Nicole (Pippa Grandison) breaks the news to Muriel – they don’t want her to hang around with them anymore. Muriel’s reaction is extreme, even for her.
Curator’s notes
The film was extremely clever at manipulating stereotypes for comic effect, while pushing the situations into the realm of tragedy. Toni Collette’s fears at the end are given extra screen time, to allow her despair to sink in. Most comedies would have cut away from this earlier, but Hogan lingers long enough for the scene to become truly emotional, as well as comical. This is important, because what Hogan is saying about these other characters could easily become vicious. Hogan keeps our sympathies focused on Muriel, whose pain justifies the way he treats these other characters. This manipulation of our sympathies is one of the most skilful aspects of the film, partly because Hogan gives even these reprehensible women – three witches from the high school playground – an edge of melancholy. They are not happy or fortunate; the difference between them and Muriel is that she knows she’s not.
