The Autopsy of Jane Doe is a 2016 movie directed by André Øvredal which is his first English language film. It stars Emile Hirsch as Austin, Brian Cox as Tommy and Olwen Kelly as the beautiful Jane Doe. The Autopsy of Jane Doe (2016) movie
The movie stars off with the father and son coroners getting ready to close up for the night. They are interrupted when the police roll in a body of a female that has no apparent signs of any trauma. The coroners are given a short amount of time to find the cause of her death. This is when we meet Jane Doe which is gender neutral name given to a deceased whose identity is either unknown or needed to be withheld in a legal action or case. Jane is very pale with clouded eyes and a calm peaceful expression on her face.
The autopsy begins as a regular procedure but soon turns into an unusual case as it progresses. Tommy’s character, an old grizzled experienced coroner, finds many unusual things that are a bit off with the body. Nothing he could not explain or has not seen in his long career. He coaches his son and explains things along the way. The entire movie consists of dialogue between these two characters and they do a good job with the back and forth they have. As they keep finding more and more strange things wrong with the body, things start to become very uneasy. Tommy tries to keep a cool rational mind while his son starts to explore ideas that are more far fetched.
For most of the movie, the three characters are confined in the morgue which serves it well because it creates a sense of dread and isolation. Olwen Kelly’s character IMO steals the show. From her calm expression to the amazingly perfect comatose body she had, she managed to steal focus and create a tense mood without saying a word. Not that I didn’t care about the other two main characters. It was the fact that I wanted to know more about Jane and how her life was before she died. Without spoiling, we get some details about her but not a lot. She is still mysterious in her own way and I think this is definitely a good thing. Her body tells a traumatic tale that is not needed to be supported with actual life details.
The entire story kept me asking for more as I wanted to know more about Jane’s past. I think this was done well because not too much was revealed but it had a great pacing where it was revealed in increments, giving us a chance to come up with our own conclusions before more backstory was revealed. I think overall the movie was great. It had an interesting plot as well as great characters who were average people that we can relate to. Again, Olwen Kelly was fantastic and her ability to control her breathing well has given her such a believable appearance as a mysterious dead woman who had a troubled past. It was a complete blast to see all these pieces falling into place and her story being unraveled.
P.S. There is A LOT of nudity (many of it full frontal) in this movie. Just FYI in case this bothers you.
