Mark Reviews Movies: PROMISING YOUNG WOMAN

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Review by Mark Dujsik | December 24, 2020

A group of three guys are out at a bar one night after work. Two of them are talkative and more than a bit crude about women, but one of the guys doesn't seem to want anything to do with that kind of talk. They all note a woman, visibly drunk and sitting alone across the room. The two rowdier guys continue their conversation in the same tone, but now, they have a specific target at whom to aim their coarse observations and hypothetical scenarios.

The apparent outlier isn't going to have any of this, either. He goes over to the woman, starts talking to her, makes sure she is fine and has a way home, and offers to set up a ride for her, after she discovers her cellphone is missing. The guy seems nice and considerate, but then, he suggests that the woman, still obviously quite intoxicated, should just come over to his apartment. She doesn't agree, but she doesn't disagree, either. That's all this guy doesn't need to hear.

He's in for a shock, though. She isn't drunk.

The opening sequence of writer/director Emerald Fennell's debut feature sets up the problem. Let's just call it straight: The problem is men. Either they, like the two guys at the bar, are blatantly dismissive about women as anything other than sex objects, framing their view of and behavior toward women in that way, or they, like the so-called "nice guy" of the trio, put on a good front to hide their true intentions.

Guys can yell and whine about how "not all men" are like this, but to do so would be missing the point of Promising Young Woman. It doesn't matter if there are true outliers or how many there might be in the world. When it comes to the particular situation from the opening scenes of the film (and many, many other situations), only one of two options exist.

Beyond that, women understand this fact. They know it, either from personal experience or through stories from friends, family members, and strangers. Cassie (Carey Mulligan), the woman from the bar, knows and understands it about as well as anyone can. This is her regular routine—going to a bar, pretending to be drunk, waiting for inevitable moment that some "nice guy" offers help and then tries to take advantage of her. It always happens, without fail. That's when the very sober Cassie teaches the guy a very sobering lesson.

Fennel's film is framed as a kind of revenge drama, in which Cassie, fueled by the trauma of knowing her best friend was raped and that nothing was done about it, routinely arranges a situation similar to the tragic one that ruined her friend's life. It's not exactly about revenge, though—at least for the first section of this story. It's about power—trying to reclaim and use it teach these guys what should be a patently obvious lesson. It's not obvious, though, for reasons Fennel knows are perhaps too engrained in society to fully dissect. If society and, more importantly, specific people have failed, though, someone has to say and do something about that failure.

Here, that someone is Cassie, played with such nuance by Mulligan. This is a character defined by the pain and righteous rage of knowing how much society, institutions, and people can and often do fail women, but Cassie also has multiple roles to play. At the bars, she's a sexual predator's easy target, but in her everyday routine, she's the woman putting on a mask, trying to convince others that all of this ache and anger haven't affected her as much as they have.

She was a medical student before her friend was assaulted, and now, she works at a coffee shop. Her parents (played by Clancy Brown and Jennifer Collidge) don't recognize the young woman their daughter once was. When she becomes reacquainted with former medical school classmate Ryan (Bo Burnham), though, the parents note—and we have to believe—that some of the old spark has returned to Cassie. Is this man the outlier—the genuinely nice guy, with no quotes required? Fennel has shown us that we can't believe appearances (Burnham is charming enough here to make us doubt the deserved skepticism), but the path and final destination of this romance are still a surprise.

The plot eventually revolves around Cassie selecting and going after targets who were directly or indirectly involved in the attack on her friend. Some, like Madison (Alison Brie), of them didn't believe the friend. One of them, namely the school's dean (played by Connie Britton), made excuses for and protected the rapist. A lawyer (played by Alfred Molina) confesses to a career of fighting for clients like the friend's assailant—and dragging the names and reputations of victims through the mud to make the fight easier.

Cassie's ultimate goal, of course, is Al (Chris Lowell), the attacker himself, who has become a successful doctor and is about to get married. He has gotten away with his crime, and Cassie is determined to correct that failing—no matter the cost.

Much inevitably will be made of the course the story of Promising Young Woman takes in its third act, which could be perceived as either a major betrayal of a character or a subversive shift in perspective that solidifies Fennel's case. It's a daring and completely unexpected move, to be sure. The turn feels like a betrayal, because it is. We're left to deal with the consequences and implications of the blunt honesty in that move.

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