about the movie Compliance
- The movie was dark, and it was filled with characters who did violent things to each other, slogging through the caramel of their lack of agency
- There was a premise, and then, once the premise was accepted, events just kept building on top of that first premise even though the events became more and more totally fucked
- The movie had a lot in it about victim/perpetrator relationship, and power and trauma, that I don’t feel right talking about because SPOILERS but basically, the power dynamics are totally fucked
- Afterwards Ellen went to pee and when she came back out to the lobby I said that even though there’s a crime against a woman in this movie, the movie passed the Bechdel test: two women, talking to each other, about something other than a dude (it was about work)
- “We live in a rape culture and that makes this movie able to exist and OK” Ellen said (I may be paraphrasing)
- This means something like: the movie takes place in a horrible setting, but does not offend me as a woman viewer because it does not insult me even though it acknowledges that I can be a victim
- We live in a world where simply accepting the premise of a power relationship can turn into abuse against a young woman (or anyone in a position of less power) and there are secondary victims who can also be secondary perpetrators, and go along with a scenario because the premise is totally unquestionable
- A romantic comedy is a stylized version of this stupid premise-accepting, and therefore a stylized version of rape culture, too, but it’s more insulting and it offends me more
- My projectionist boyfriend says that people have been walking out of this movie saying “It asks so much of the audience” or “I was never so offended”
- Look, movies should ask a lot of you and you should think hard about them, especially if you find yourself short-circuiting in the middle of them
