Putting this candy-coloured take on the way sexual abuse can sour a life seems like the dictionary definition of counter-programming during the holidays. But this aggressively provoking film – in which Cassandra (Carey Mulligan) becomes a #metoo vigilante – is close enough to a traditional superhero / revenge film to feel like a much-needed corrective to the usual holiday action thrill-rides.
By day 30 year-old Cassandra (Carey Mulligan) seems to be wasting her life, working a dead-end customer service job and living with her puzzled parents: by night she goes out, pretends to be drunk, and waits for “nice guys” to try and pick her up. They get more than what they bargained for; eventually, so does the audience.
The usual payback thrills from this kind of film are here but this has more on its mind than just sweet revenge. Cassandra’s backstory is slowly filled in to become a hard-hitting look at the way abuse can derail a life, and just how difficult it can be to get back on track - especially when everyone on that track is acting like it never happened and even if it did, was it really so bad?
This never questions the necessity of her actions, but it's doesn't exactly revel in them. Cassandra's character is too well developed for this to remain the one-note vigilante thriller it initially seems to promise, and her mission of vengeance has just enough nuance to keep things uncomfortable.
Not every step here is as sure-footed as it could be (the ending manages to be satisfyingly uplifting on a thematic level while remaining grimly downbeat in its specifics) and Mulligan's exhaustive, exhausting performance carries things more than it should, but there's more than enough verve here to get it across the line in style.
The casting of a steady stream of dreamboat TV stars (Adam Brody, Max Greenfield, Christopher Mintz-Plasse) as the parade of creeps Cassandra encounters are the candles on this brightly iced cake, playing characters so similar to their starring roles you’ll wonder why you never realised they were scum all along.
- Anthony Morris
No comments:
Post a Comment