By Jay A. Fernandez

Let’s get this out of the way up front: In Michael Winterbottom’s “The Killer Inside Me,” Jessica Alba is pulverized, fist to face, fist to face, fist to poor pretty face, by Casey Affleck for a good three minutes or so. Until her eyes are swollen shut and part of her face has been smashed away, exposing her jaw. What one character later describes as “hamburger,” “stewed meat.”

It’s ultra-real, excruciating to watch and, in some viewers’ minds, inexcusable.

When Affleck’s sociopathic deputy sheriff, Lou Ford, does something similar to Kate Hudson’s character later in the nihilistic noir, Winterbottom and crew lost even more of the audience. Not that they walked out of the night-time premiere screening at the Eccles, mind you. They waited until the moment the lights came up for a Q&A with the filmmakers, and Winterbottom started fielding vehement criticism about the violence toward women.

First question: “Disgusting!” yelled a woman as she got up and stormed up the aisle.

Winterbottom, after a long pause: “Next question?”