By, Mackenzie Boyce
The day the first trailer dropped, Olivia Wilde’s new film, “Don’t Worry Darling,” quickly placed at the top of my list for most anticipated films of the year. After an interesting slew of drama at the Venice Film Festival, and an onslaught of negative reviews, I eventually became weary of the film I had been waiting for months to finally see.
Despite the discussions of poor acting, plot holes and writing issues, I still decided to go see Wilde’s film with an open mind. If you have not seen the trailer, which would be shocking with the amount of internet controversy it has caused, the film stars Florence Pugh, alongside Harry Styles in one of his first acting debuts. The psychological thriller follows the story of Alice (Pugh) and Jack (Styles), who live in an ideal 1950s community where the men go to work at their top secret job headquarters every day. After a series of strange occurrences, Alice begins to question why she is in this community, and what secrets may be hidden within the world as she knows it.
Overall, I thought the plot was well done, contrary to what the TikTok reviews have said about this film. Although I agree there were a few loose ends that were never tied, I think in general the outside drama has given this film an undeservedly bad rap. Psychological thrillers as a genre often leave you with questions, one of my favorite parts about this movie. The things that were left unsaid allow for theories, and make you use critical thinking to draw your own conclusions. Although I would love to know more about the airplanes, earthquakes and inner workings of Victory, I also loved that I could make my own answers to the questions.
The most important part is that I was entertained, and I spent the whole movie on the edge of my seat. There was a strong story with a good twist, although a bit predictable in my opinion, and I fully enjoyed the storytelling, alongside the beautiful cinematography, set design and costuming.
Now let’s talk about the elephant in the room: the acting. I think the internet can agree that Florence Pugh stole the show, which came as no surprise because she is such a talented actress. However, the world seems to be split on Harry Styles’, music sensation who has recently taken up a career in acting, performance in the film. This is his first major role in a film since Christopher Nolan’s “Dunkirk” (2019), and many fans claim his acting was comical.
As a Harry Styles fan, I was definitely nervous to see his performance, because something I cannot hide is my strong opinions about bad acting. However, I was pleasantly surprised. I don’t think Styles stood out as particularly bad, and I also don’t think he stood out as particularly amazing. Overall his performance was fine, and although clear he is new to the acting scene, I think most of the laughter towards his performance comes from the difficulty to separate his positive and bubbly personality in real life from the character he plays.
All in all, I don’t think this was the best film of the year, but I also don’t believe it deserves the harsh criticism it has received online. I would recommend this movie to anyone who likes mysteries or thrillers, and think it was overall an enjoyable experience. Although the world has divided opinions on “Don’t Worry Darling,” I think we can all agree that it’s at least worth seeing for another amazing performance by Florence Pugh.