A 1950s housewife, who lives in a utopian experimental community founded by the secret company her husband works for, suspects that this glamorous universe hides disturbing secrets.
Posted at 10:30 a.m.
Even before its launch, the reputation of this feature film was already tainted by controversies which specialized newspapers made their headlines, in particular about an alleged disagreement between the main actress, Florence Pugh, and the director, Olivia Wilde. . Backstage stories, worthy of a soap opera, also marked the filming, to the point that they took precedence over everything else.
Without being a great success, Don’t Worry Darling remains an interesting feature film, if only thanks to the parallels that can easily be drawn between the era evoked in the story – the 1950s – and ours, particularly with regard to the status of women. In this regard, we can certainly see it as a social and political film.
The promotion is very much focused on Harry Styles, pop music superstar who for the first time has a major role in the cinema (more or less convincingly, let’s say it), but this feature film is first and foremost the case of Florence Pugh. The latter excels in the role of a young woman who falls into a seemingly perfect world, but who, under the veneer, hides another much more sinister one.
In this small community built in the middle of the desert thanks to a mysterious project, for which all their husbands work, the women, entirely devoted to their man, are kept in the dark and must follow very strict rules. Certain territories are completely forbidden to them. Even if this story takes place seven decades ago, the speeches advocating the return to “traditional” values are strangely similar to those adopted today by certain ultra-conservative leaders almost everywhere in the world.
After the great BooksmartOlivia Wilde offers as director an ambitious production, very slick (the artistic direction brings back the iconography of the time in all its brilliance), however undermined by a scriptwriting pirouette that we see coming too far.
Launched at the Venice Film Festival, during which a first version of this text was published, Don’t Worry Darling (don’t worry darling in French version) is now showing.
Drama
Don’t Worry Darling (VF: don’t worry darling)
Olivia Wilde
With Florence Pugh, Harry Styles and Chris Pine
2:02 a.m.