Directed by Olivia Wilde
Language: English
Year: 2022
Shaun’s Rating: 2.7/5 ★
Before Watching:
Needless to say, before watching Olivia Wilde’s newest thriller, I was worried, darling. The film’s reputation preceded it, with scandals ranging from the allegedly unceremonious departure of Shia LaBeouf to the cold war between Wilde and star Florence Pugh, and even the baffling case of Harry Styles apparently spitting on Chris Pine at the premiere. While much of this is surely just schoolyard gossip, it left such an uncomfortable taste in my mouth that I was ready to pull a Harry before firing up the HBO Max. Honestly, Shia LaBeouf probably just wanted to pursue his true calling as an actual cannibal in Bones and All.
Alice Chambers (Pugh) and her husband Jack (Styles) live an idyllic, I Love Lucy life in the desert town of Victory. Alice is the quintessential housewife—meeting her beau with drink in hand when he returns home from his arcane job, always having dinner on the table, even indulging in the occasional poolside gossip. Within a few scenes, her world starts to unravel as she experiences a barrage of audiovisual hallucinations and muffled, unfamiliar memories. Alice (now in Wonderland) begins worrying that the enigmatic community she calls home might not be as well intentioned as it purports, while Jack’s career sees foreboding developments and some of the other housewives express their own suspicions. Wilde’s splicing of reality is creative—neither failing to intrigue nor giving too much away—and Pugh’s refreshingly gripping portrayal carries the film’s emotional momentum.
Don’t Worry Darling is indeed well made, but it’s also painfully unoriginal. The opening premise has been seen dozens of times from The Stepford Wives and Suburbicon to WandaVision, and the twist… well, let’s just say we know it is the same “As It Was.” The film’s sleek production builds suspense that eventually feels like treading water, with too many redundant flashes and too little payout. It’s especially disappointing that the final act wastes all of the nuance and intrigue of the supporting cast, who stop mattering before the audience has time to realize it. Not to mention, the film also suffers from Styles’s subpar acting and inability to match Pugh’s conviction; the imbalance is difficult to swallow, though it seems Harry prefers spitting anyway.
“My favorite thing about the movie is like, it feels like a movie.”
The film is better than you might expect from its reviews, but not nearly good enough to support the never-ending media frenzy. It succeeds in spinning a web of intrigue, but fails in executing a compelling or even coherent narrative. It’s messy, and ultimately too derivative to go Wilde about.
Don’t Worry Darling premiered at the Venice International Film Festival, and was released in the United States in September. It can now be streamed on HBO Max.
After Watching:
Had I experienced this film at two months old, before Neo took the red pill or Jim Carrey sailed to the exit hatch in The Truman Show (1998), I might have been more impressed with this twist. The concept of simulated reality or even puppeteered/gamified reality has existed in cinema long before Don’t Worry Darling, and has typically yielded better results when the big reveal comes earlier in the film. Wilde’s fourth quarter revelation leaves insufficient time to answer all of our questions—what were the mysterious earthquake-like sounds in Victory? What was the red plane that both Margaret and Alice followed into the desert? What on earth was Jack’s promotion?
Two unexpected delights are Gemma Chan and Jonah from Veep, both of whom give very convincing performances. The film benefits from—ugh sorry, I just have to revisit the list of loose ends. What does Chan’s Shelley mean with her final ominous “it’s my turn now”? How is Alice’s real body surviving with just a few drops of water and no bathroom breaks? It seems like the only question we did have answered was “Is Jack supposed to be British?”, which was met with a resounding “…I guess so?”
It's not atypical for Venice to debut many of the year’s strangest releases, but Don’t Worry Darling stands out for its frankly unhinged ratio of media buzz to follow-through. The film could have used more character development and less of the same three vision sequences on loop. I always love a blockbuster psychological thriller, but hopefully next time that love won’t be so One Direction-al.