When someone says “Movies can be, or should be, more than just entertainment,” this is the type of movie to which they are referring.  Promising Young Woman is about all kinds of issues important to our society today; the fact that it is a movie seems almost incidental.  It is one of those movies that can be interpreted from many different perspectives, and which says contradictory things, all of which are true.  It is an in-your-face indictment of sexism and sexual assault, which it explores and condemns in provocative and jarring ways.  It is not easy to watch, yet it is impossible to turn away from it.  It is a remarkable debut film from writer / director / actress Emerald Fennell.

Emerald Fennell’s film follows Cassie Thomas (Carey Mulligan), a former medical school student, while she gets drunk at bars and allows men to take her home.  But then the tables turn, as Cassie is not what she seems.  It all stems from losing a friend, Nina, some years before, who was a victim of rape — an unpunished crime.  Cassie has taken it upon herself to avenge women against male predators, and when not-so-innocent people from her med school past reappear in her life, their seeming happiness and unwillingness to remember anything about Nina push Cassie toward even more drastic action.

Revenge dramas are a common fixture of cinematic tradition.  But this is a suspenseful revenge comedy, written and directed to maximize its provocation and impact.  It is controversial and disturbing precisely because it is a woman taking charge and avenging one of her own; if this boasted a male protagonist and masculine story, it might not draw much notice at all.  The other factor in its favor is its low violence quotient; unlike Peppermint, where Jennifer Garner avenges her dead family by killing everyone in sight, Cassie’s onslaughts are primarily psychological, and they are all the more devastating because of intent and threat rather than carnage.

This movie works on every level.  It is a powerful character study, remarkably suspenseful, written with delicacy, raw power and finesse, and beautifully enacted by everyone from Carey Mulligan to Clancy Brown.  It made me feel all sorts of emotions at various times, because the story covers every possible feeling that Cassie feels during her venture.  The ending surprised me, but it all makes sense, although the timing could never be that precise.  But when it finished I was deeply saddened, mournful of all the wasted young lives, all because a few drunken fools couldn’t keep their pants on.  We should be better than that.  ☆ ☆ ☆ ☆.  21 January 2021.