Review: CARVED - also known by the tastier title of THE SLIT-MOUTHED WOMAN – is inspired by a Japanese myth which gives director and writer Koji Shiraishi a cool looking murderer to use to commit some nasty acts against a handful of kids. Unfortunately 'cool looking' doesn't equate to 'scary', and the myth itself doesn't seem to have given the filmmaker any sort of inspiration of exactly what to do with the character. CARVED takes the Slit-Mouthed Woman and places her against a backdrop of child abuse but fails to find a way to gel the two together coherently. It may be seen as an interesting diversion for some horror fans, but CARVED is certainly not the must-see that it could well have been.

From its outset CARVED sets up two main child abuse threads – the sort of abuse that children suffer in secret at the hands of their own parents – alongside the whispered story of the Slit-Mouthed Woman. The Slit-Mouthed Woman is a myth that is passed among school children and represents a horror for them that their parents would rather they were not talking about. The disappearance of young boy – in opening scenes that are more atmospheric than anything else in the rest of the film - seem to confirm the myth for the children - while the adults view the disappearance as a kidnapping. Early on CARVED seems well on its way to exploring unspoken horrors of hideous acts towards children. So far, so good.

For the first fifteen minutes or so, CARVED does actually seem to be going somewhere. Although it's not exactly subtle, it's fascinating – but not scary - enough to keep your attention. We don't have to wait long before the first appearance of our woman with the messed up looking mouth and the big pair of scissors but, sadly, it doesn't take too long before the doubts also kick in. It becomes obvious all too soon that the filmmakers won't be developing these plot threads very far – becoming increasingly reliant purely on the image of the Slit-Mouthed Woman to hold our interest, and a strong visual image alone does not make a film work. As if to highlight this lack of direction at the midway mark, CARVED even becomes guilty of laying on a very lazy plot twist – a character suddenly 'remembers' the hideous events in their past that just happens to explain a big chunk of what is going on. Rather than feeling like a big change in pace and events, its so unsubtle that this point in the film is where many people will find that they have lost interest.

The biggest disappointment with CARVED is that it has a narrative that seems to unfold and work its way to it conclusion without any real thought, feeling way too by-the-numbers. While it just about remains entertaining enough on a surface level, both the main and sub-plots (involving Kyoko's own relationship with her daughter) make little sense. The central issue of child abuse is clear enough, but there never seems to be a point to it or any real comment made on the subject. Child abuse is bad. This much we know. We don't need CARVED to underline the point that child abuse is wrong, or that it is a crime that is hidden away from public viewing. The abusive relationships displayed in the film suggest the filmmakers are trying to make a comment about the nature of abuse, but sadly this doesn't happen. There's plenty of routes the scriptwriters could go with regards to the subject matter, but disappointingly they choose the most simplistic one. In fact, when thought through to its own 'logical' conclusion, CARVED ends up only displaying its own unfounded distrust of women. As it stands, the obvious potential of the material is lost and CARVED is no more complex than your average teen-slasher – and not even as effective.

A word of warning to the more sensitive viewers of the film - CARVED is pretty graphic in its depiction of child abuse and so, of course, it doesn't make for easy viewing. By making the victims of the Slit-Mouthed Woman young children (instead of the usual annoying teenagers), CARVED does have some very real elements of horror at its core. Strangely, this fairly realistic approach to child abuse renders the actual killer as a bit of a shallow – although undeniably cool-looking – character, while the only effective horror on screen is in the way CARVED brutalises its young cast. While this has the effect of being truly horrifying (it's a horror film after all!), it also becomes pretty pointless – I hesitate to say gratuitous because it IS effective - purely in contrast to the shallowness of the rest of its characters.

The cast of CARVED aren't too bad considering the material they have to work with, although on occasion there's some wobbly sceens. Still, they manage to run around, look confused - occasionally scared – and somehow piece together the mystery of the murderous woman while looking (sort of) convincingly like it all makes sense. Miki Mizuno as the Slit-Mouthed Woman herself is respectably unnerving – mainly by standing very still and wielding a bloody great pair of shears. It works – although developing the character would have of course made her a more effective screen presence.