Rating B-｜Don't Worry Darling：Men hate but women like it

In the world of movies, women are just appendages of men.

“Get a hold of yourself， Alice. you’re behaving like a child. your husband is out there having the most important night of his life”, When Alice, the heroine, was asked to stop being angry and forced to smile to accompany her husband， “Whose world is this？ Ours！”， Alice's husband is reveling with other men in a world where men are winners.

This is just a short scene in the film. Countless sequences of male and female values conflict throughout the film. There is no doubt that feminism is the theme of Don't Worry Darling.

'Don't Worry Darling' Is a Utopian film. Such themes are not new. There are similar themes such as the classic film Truman's World and 2021's Free Guy. The plot is a bit old-fashioned.

However, the interesting part of this film is about the awakening of female consciousness and the metaphor of survival and life.

This is the second film directed by Olivia Wilde. Compared with her last film, the youth comedy "Booksmart", the theme and style changes a lot; The director's skill has also become more fluent.

Let's see how these superb director skills are reflected in the film.

1. Camera language design full of metaphor.

When Alice visited the community model in the Victory project, the director designed a close-up of touching the model with his finger. This is a hint that the town is controlled by a huge "hand". This design reminds me of Westworld.

When Alice was cooking at home as a housewife, the close-up of the pickled steak made the audience uncomfortable. This piece of meat that Alice plays with is just as delicious as Alice herself but is manipulated by others.

When Alice cleaned the bathtub at home, the mirror on the wall suggested Alice's real life is trapped. This scene is repeated many times in the film.

In the shopping mall of the Victory community, some women pretend to play tennis gracefully outdoors, and someother women who display happy housewives' lives in front of the shop window. In these scenes, the director tells the audience all the time that the beautiful life in front of them is an illusion, and the happiness under the illusion is meaningless.

"I don't know why, but I just feel something is wrong."

It causes its audience to ask questions and tests their patience by withholding and bestowing information in just the right doses.

2. In the process of the main story, the insertion point of the flashback clip is set very well.

Many strange flashbacks in the film have nothing to do with the main plot. These flashbacks are very strange, even a little scary. Until the end, the audience can understand their original Alice memory of the real world. These flashbacks consist of black and white video frames， the main storyline of the movie is composed of colorful video images， and the contrast between the two is very strong and has a strong visual impact. Although each flashback lasts only a few seconds, it constantly reminds the audience that the world is not normal. At the same time, it also plays a role in adjusting the rhythm. In the first half of the film, the progress of the story is very slow. When the audience feels bored, the sudden flashback is like the jump scale of a horror film, which makes the audience's mood change from relaxation to tension.

2. The choice of location is great. The exaggerated scenery reflects the theme of the film.

Anyone who’s been to Palm Springs or the surrounding towns is familiar with that mid-20th century architecture, the clean lines and sharp angles standing out in sharp contrast to the vibrant, rough desert all around you. It can be a very surreal place, which is perhaps why it’s a popular vacation destination, and also the perfect setting for a story like this, where one’s grasp on reality can be fleeting.

However, although the film has the above advantages, it is still not a good film. It does not impress the audience. In my opinion, the biggest problem of this film is the script. This story has many unreasonable loopholes. For example, Alice lives in a world created by Jack. So why is Jack so happy when he gets promoted in this world? This makes no sense at all.

Slow-paced so it has a lot of suspense, arousing questions all movie long, and when they finally start getting answered it's too little too late; the reveal is not big enough to justify the wait.

Besides, the truth revealed at the end of the film is really boring. It destroys the suspense created by the whole film and also destroys the feminist theme of the film.

An ambitious vision overloaded with big themes and lofty messages that have been buried in a thriller with no thrills, all of which takes place in a world whose rules have not been thought through beyond how they can be used to help the filmmakers say something meaningful about women’s evolving role in society. (To avoid the fun of watching movies, I will not describe it in detail in the article. In a word, the ending of the story is very bad.)

Here is my final opinion of this film： The music, the clothes and at least one of the stars are worth your time. While it's far from the sum of its parts, Don't Worry Darling is a perfectly entertaining B-movie. It was an ambitious attempt and showing of Wilde's ability but ultimately underwhelming. Just feels like it's missing something. Not as bad as the press around it was, nor as good as those who were hoping for it thought it was going to be.

By the way，Florence Pugh performed very well in the film.Her performance has raised the quality of the film to a higher level.

Rating：B-