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  • Alternative Character Interpretation:
    • Mitch. An insecure man who legitimately wants the best for his family and wants to make his marriage work, despite prioritizing his own needs and desires over his family and being abusive and controlling? Or a self-centered psycho who could care less about the best for his family and is more concerned about the best for himself and has no problem mistreating them for his own advantage whenever he feels like it, and only wants them for self-benefit? The movie doesn't make it clear at all, but Mitch's behavior at times seem to lean towards the second interpretation.
    • Even though she clearly did not deserve the abuse or infidelity that Mitch subjected her to, some fans believe that Slim ignored all the warning signs about him (his driven personality, the fact that, although he most likely than not paid him off handsomely, he ordered a complete stranger out of his home just so he and Slim could have it, the fact that he wouldn't let her hold Gracie after she was born, etc.) was because she was a Gold Digger and also left Joe due to him having more money than he does.
    • Also, there are fans who believe that Joe's own "Nice Guy" persona is little more than an act, in pretending to be so he is just as bad (if not worse) than Mitch and will change after he and Slim get together.
  • Broken Base: Is the movie a relatable and accurate portrayal of Domestic Abuse that shows a true (even if not perfect) empowerment of women against abusive and entitled men? Or is it just another Hollywood message movie that relies too much on cliches to get the message across? People often have a field day with this, especially when you consider the Misaimed Fandom of it.
  • Misaimed Fandom: Chances are anybody who has been in or even close to domestic violence situations will praise and idealize this film to the point of ignoring any potential flaws. The movie clearly demonstrates that an abused housewife breaking into her husband's new residence and planning to give him a taste of his own medicine before killing him with premeditated lethal force wouldn't do her any legal or moral favors. Yet many people who relate and sympathize with domestic violence victims thought it was absolutely cool to see her in action, which defeats the entire purpose of Slim not having the heart to finish Mitch off. Not to mention that the movie is also treated as if it's very accurate to real life, when it really relies on a lot of classic Hollywood cliches and tropes for the most part.
  • Narm: Factor Nine, Captain!
    • Although it's apparently intended to be serious, as Roger Ebert noted, Mitch is a completely absurd, Flanderized caricature of an abusive husband; not just a hybridization of Germaine Greer's worst nightmare, and Godzilla in human form, he's also, for the purposes of the plot, practically omnipotent. The scene where he rampages through the house of Slim's terrified parents is particularly amusing. Mitch himself may not necessarily be in it For the Evulz (he's generally shown to be angry), but that's no reason for us in the audience not to be.
    • Slim suddenly has a self-defense coach, who teaches her and her alone, and even briefly narrates the final fight as if to say "use the force".
    • Jennifer Lopez and Juliette Lewis' joint-catchphrase: "Piece of cake, piece of pie". This is repeated numerous times throughout the film. Towards the end, they even abbreviate it to the non-sequitur "Cake, pie".
  • Questionable Casting: Jennifer Lopez as a poor, down-on-her-luck waitress? Billy Campbell as a wife-beater? Noah Wyle as his evil wingman?
  • The Scrappy: Gracie, Mitch and Slim's young daughter, whose only characterization during the course of the film is to be cute, whiny, shrieking, crying or sleeping. Even if you can't blame the girl for her parents' cruelty/stupidity, it still doesn't stop her from coming off as The Load who unintentionally impeded her mother's efforts to escape and provoked her father to his levels of implacability (even though she may have been written as such).
  • They Copied It, So It Sucks!: You can't help but notice a more than passing resemblance between this movie and 1991's Sleeping with the Enemy, which many regard as a superior film, especially because the portrayal of Domestic Abuse is generally agreed to be far more realistic in that film. note 
  • They Wasted a Perfectly Good Character: Out of the many criticisms the film received, one of the biggest complaints was that the film never even once bothers to try to humanize Mitch's possessive and dominant personalities or his particularly stubborn depiction of abusive behavior, not even a little bit. This resulted in many viewers seeing his character simply as a very bland and uninteresting psycho villain in a depiction of domestic violence, with little understanding of the character. It certainly doesn't help that they just went from the marriage almost instantly straight to the abuse timeline rather than showing more context that Mitch was a wacko.
  • They Wasted a Perfectly Good Plot: As mentioned above, the movie seems to focus far more on the "kill or be killed" and female empowerment themes, as well as turning it into an half-action thriller, at the expense of much characterization and the effects that domestic violence has on women and people in general, not to mention that the supporting characters are simply there to move the plot forward and don't do much else in the story. This is considered a fairly common reason why the film is a good candidate for being considered a Lifetime film.
  • Values Resonance: While the movie doesn't really explore Mitch's personality, the persistent and arrogant and entitled way he thinks and behaves has certainly become more in line with what can often seen on social media platforms in the late 2010s and especially going into the 2020s.
  • Vindicated by History: Upon its release, the film received mostly negative reviews. However, in recent years, it has received a bit of a reappraisal, with many now dubbing it an underrated thriller.

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