[Film Review] Promising Young Woman (2021)

The culture surrounding rape revenge movies can be an exceptionally empowering and liberating one, especially through the perspective of women.

For years male critics were slamming films such as I Spit On Your Grave as something that was demeaning and dehumanising to women, and that seemed to be the gospel that we had to follow. However, in more recent years women critics have started to have their voices heard, and their opinions on an issue that directly affects them as so many have been subject to sexual abuse, rape and trauma. This surge of actually hearing the thoughts on rape revenge as a sub-genre has been a liberating experience, and continues. Emerald Fennell is best known for written work of TV show Killing Eve, and she has also starred in many films and TV including The Crown and Call The Midwife. After the intense success of Killing Eve, Fennell has gone on to direct her debut feature, Promising Young Woman, which might just be one of the most insightful, realistic and powerful rape-revenge films to exist. 

Cassandra Thomas, who mainly goes by Cassie, is what they would describe a “promising young woman”. She has the whole world ahead of her, yet everyone around her seems to be critical of the life she chose to live and cannot understand why she works at a coffee shop, lives with her parents and frequents late night bars alone at night instead of having gone down the road that society expected of her. But Cassie leads a particularly dark double life that no-one knows about; at night she spends her time poaching repulsive men who believe that there is no harm in taking an exceptionally intoxicated woman home with them, even if she can barely stand or talk, let alone consent. Once Cassie has these low-life men where she wants them, she teaches them an important lesson that they will never forget. 

From the very beginning of Promising Young Woman, there is this air of power, dominance and triumph about Cassie that is easy to aspire to. Women are often made to feel as though they should be these damsels in distress and need someone to constantly come to their rescue in times of need, and even in times when they do not need any help. With Cassie’s character, this vulnerability doesn’t show on-screen and that provides the viewer with a really empowering sense of who she is, and helps us to feel a warmth towards what she does to these men who constantly keep on taking advantage. The realities of rape culture are quickly established within the film, and just feel heartbreakingly real from the get-go, which throughout the film can feel incredibly difficult to watch. Witnessing Cassie being taken back to Jerry’s (played chillingly by Adam Brody) place even though she can barely speak her own name brings back horrific flashbacks on personal traumatic experiences, and gave me a nauseous feeling, however, it also felt important to see a scene like this truthfully depicted on screen, to help open the eyes of the viewer to what really happens to intoxicated women. 

Rape revenge films often become a heightened sense of fantasy which helps to provide a cathartic experience to the viewer. What Fennell does with Promising Young Woman is provide the audience with this revenge plot that helps to exorcise the demons and hold a sense of comfort, but she never allows that element to slip too far into something completely unattainable. The film has been described as bleak and pessimistic in places, which is hard to argue with, however isn’t that the point of a film like this? The truth of the matter is that women (and men) who have been raped or sexually assaulted, have to live every single day of their lives with that playing on repeat in their minds; they have anxiety to walk down the road for fear of what sick sexual scenes play out in the minds of passers-by, they cannot escape the reality of what they have been through and will find certain everyday things trigger emotions. Fennell doesn’t hold back on this grim realism, and even to the very end of the film makes it known that rape culture doesn’t have a happy ending, and even when it comes to getting revenge, there really isn’t a completely happy ending either. 

Carey Mulligan leads as Cassie in the film, and delivers one of the most authentic and electric performances ever. The character of Cassie is not an easy one to deliver, yet Mulligan does this effortlessly and elegantly, allowing the viewer full immersion into the vengeance seeking world that Cassie has built for herself. As someone that has had very similar personal traumas and grievances in my past, there was never a moment that I wasn’t able to emotionally and mentally connect to Mulligan’s portrayal, and it felt as if she was pulling on her own past to interpret this story and deliver it in a way that would make women everywhere feel seen and understood. Without an enigmatic lead that pulled off every line of satirical humour or delivered every piece of distinguished and loud body language, the film could have really lost its connection to the audience. 

Something that was surprising during the film was the subtlety of violence and any on-screen carnage in nearly all forms. From experience, rape revenge films often rely heavily on revenge drenched in blood and there is a high chance of seeing some form of male castration at the hands of the woman seeking revenge. Fennell takes the opposite approach and although ensures the predators of the film are seen to be put in their place and frightened by Cassie’s endeavours, it is all done without the use of violence, which came as an interesting choice to make. Admittedly there were times during the film where worry flashed through my mind as it seemed like Cassie was to either seriously harm someone or even put another female in danger, yet every choice made here was intelligent and never verged on the edge of unrealistic or became excessively violent. 

Watching this film was like a continuous gut punch that never stopped from landing raging blow after blow. The devastating truth is painfully displayed across the screen, reinforcing the reality that rape culture is thriving, and women all over the world are being chastised of their basic human right to live without being raped or sexually assaulted. This is not a film that serves revenge cold and allows everyone to be a winner, it’s quite the opposite; although revenge is gotten, it is still tragic, heart-breaking and devastating to watch. It has been sometime since a film has evoked such an emotional response in me and left me with a hangover of feelings that reminded me of my own personal traumas. Promising Young Woman is a bleak and distressing look at the toxicity of rape culture and how it can completely eradicate lives, with revenge served with a side dish of depressing realism. 

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