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"Strangers shouldn't talk to little girls."
- tagline
A 2005 psychological thriller/ Exploitation Film featuring Patrick Wilson and Ellen Page as a 32-year old photographer named Jeff Kohlver and the precocious 14-year-old Hayley Stark. They meet at a cafe after chatting online, and agree to go to Jeff's secluded house to have a little fun, where Hayley mixes the drinks and strips for a photo session. It seems that Jeff has the advantage, when he passes out and comes to, he is tied to a chair and being investigated by a not-so-innocent teenage girl. What follows is a series of arguments, cat-and-mouse games and psychological torture sessions, culminating in a tense rooftop encounter.
The film is interesting, due to its controversial nature and unsympathetic and hard-to-categorize lead characters.
Not to be confused with the Counting Crows' song or the Madonna album of the same name. Or actual hard candy.
This film provides examples of:
- Acceptable Targets - Some have theorized that Hayley is just a sociopathic sadist who looks for socially acceptable targets, like pedophiles.
- Alone With The Psycho - Subverted, or played with, in that the roles of "psycho" and "victim" switch in the second act.
- Alternate Character Interpretation - Both characters are subject to this, more so Hayley.
- Little Miss Badass - Hayley Stark is a particularly frightening example. She could also be categorized as a Bad Ass Fille Fatale, a Heroic Sociopath, an Ax Crazy Psycho For Hire, The Hunter, a Dark Action Girl, a Knight Templar, or even a Magnificent Bastard. At one point, Hayley takes down a gun-toting Jeff with a roll of cellophane. Cellophane, people! Ellen Page is terrifying.
- Billing Displacement - See that cool, stylized poster up there? It's been replaced by bland face shots of Hayley and Jeff now that Ellen Page and Patrick Wilson are stars.
- Black And Gray Morality - When you find yourself rooting for the psychopath to defeat the pedophile...
- Technically, Jeff is a hebephile
 , not a paedophile.
- Candlelit Bath - Subverted, in its 'girl goes to take a shower with the psycho in the house' variation. When the man holding the knife bursts into the bathroom and pulls back the shower curtain, he finds it empty. Then the girl leaps out from behind him holding a stungun.
- Dawson Casting - Ellen Page was 18 when she played the 14-year-old Hayley. This is disputable, however, since the only way we find out Hayley's age is when she tells us, and she's not exactly the most trustworthy type - it's entirely possible that she's older than fourteen.
- There would also probably have been legal issues if they'd cast an actress in her minority.
- At one point it was suggested that Hayley confess to really being 18, but Ellen Page rejected this idea, as it would've undercut the whole point of the movie.
- Dirty Old Man - though in a slight subversion, he is legitimately charming and physically attractive. And only about thirty.
- Driven To Suicide mixed with Assisted Suicide, with weird Mercy Kill overtones. Yeah, it's that kind of thing.
- Exploitation Film
- Fetish Fuel - In the director's commentary, the actors mention that they were a little surprised when a eunuchs' group said that there was "finally a movie for us!"
- Film Noir - It could be seen as a twisted neo-Noir, with its dark, bleak subject matter, its claustrophic setting, and its grim protagonists. Hayley could be viewed as the Anti Hero, the Femme Fatale and the Private Detective all in one, and Jeff could be seen as an Anti Hero who is destroyed by becoming entangled with the Femme Fatale.
- Disagree with giving the hebephile an Anti Hero label. He's more of a Complete Monster who happens to be having some seriously messed up stuff done to him, though the rest of the movie seems to qualify.
- Genre Savvy - While it's not explicit, both seem to know enough about psychological thriller tropes to avoid them. Hayley easily brushes off a Hannibal Lecture.
- Gory Discretion Shot - We are never shown anything during the castration scene.
- That's because it isn't happening.
- Hammerspace- Where did Hayley keep all that rope?
- Hannibal Lecture
- Hoist By His Own Petard or Karmic Death, from a certain point of view.
- Little Dead Riding Hood - Due to a lucky coincidence, Hayley's iconic garment is a red hoodie that matches the Little Red Riding Hood vibe of the first part of the movie. Later, this trope is brutally subverted by having the Riding Hood figure turn out to be the real threat.
- Masquerade
- Mind Screw - This is Hayley's main tactic.
- Misaimed Fandom - The ambiguity of the film strikes again.
- Moral Event Horizon - The notorious castration scene had some men in the audience shouting, "Kill the bitch!"
- Nightmare Fuel for some viewers, Squick for many more.
- Nosy Neighbor
- Not So Different
- Porn Stash
- Ripped From The Headlines - It's been said the story was inspired by gangs of young Japanese girls that have cropped up in recent years. They lure in certain kinds of men by playing the part of "innocent-yet-naughty" schoolgirls, and once they have him alone, they beat, rob, blackmail him.
- Scenery Porn - The director had previously done music videos. The production looks absolutely sumptuous, even though the production was made on a shoestring.
- Serial Killer - By the end of the film, Hayley has a body count of at least two men.
- Shoot The Shaggy Dog - Possibly. We learn nothing really about the character's lives and there isn't much of a moral to draw from any of the proceedings.
- Vigilante Man - Hayley tries to be something like this.
- Or, at least, that's her justification for picking the victims she does.
- Villain Protagonist - Both Jeff and Hayley. Possibly.
- Xanatos Gambit - It may have shifted into a Xanatos Roulette.
- Your Mileage May Vary - As to just about anything morally related to this film.
- Word Of God - Breaks the ambiguity to some degree; while enhancing the Misaimed Fandom aspects. At one point, the filmmakers as much as said that both characters are villain protagonists. Jeff is a predatory hebephile, and Hayley is a fledgling serial killer. Both of them are intended to be more or less equally sympathetic and repugnant; and neither are even remotely heroic.
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