I really liked Promising Young Woman, directed by Emerald Fennell (of Killing Eve) and starring Carey Mulligan as Cassie, who plays a game of sorts of pretending to be intoxicated in clubs so that “nice guys” will try to rescue her, take her home, and when they get close to assaulting her, she snaps back into being sober and terrifying them.
She had dropped out of med school following her best friend Nina, who had been raped and later died by suicide. She is living with her parents, working as a barista by day and hunting dweebs at night, and exacts a very meticulous revenge plot against all who were complicit in discrediting her friend and allowing her rapist to go free, including building up to punishing the rapist himself. It’s an interesting journey she goes on, though I felt like the film pulled some punches in order to still make her character sympathetic to the audience, I was a little more interested in her being a lot more heartless and less likable.
I liked the contrast of the bright candy color motif of the film, like her long blonde hair with bangs, gingham dresses, Hard Candy-style pastel nail polish, and her parents’ plastic-covered dinner table, against the dark and seemingly sociopathic vibe of her hit list against those who set her friend’s fate to ruin, turning the tables on them in awful but fitting ways.
I could figure out a reveal in the ending that seemed a little too perfect, as the planets had to align for this to all happen in sync. And I was a little frustrated in how things ended up for her. And I did like that this didn’t feel like a typical rape revenge movie, as I realized that what I was expecting would be a little too predictable. This isn’t Ms. 45, as I had assumed, but more calculating than that. So I’m glad I watched it, after having seen the trailer for it a year ago and it only just hit streaming a few weeks ago.
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