Don’t Worry Darling review: Olivia Wilde’s movie is ambitious but derivative

The year’s most talked about movie is finally here but was all that drama even worth it? Is the movie actually any good?

Will the scandal which engulfed Don’t Worry Darling change the way you see the film itself?

Are your expectations higher or lower – like somehow the work has to justify the fuss, to be more interesting than the discourse. Are you going in with a more critical eye, almost wishing it to fail in a streak of schadenfreude, or has the drama given it underdog status?

Keep that in mind in the cinema, how much of what you feel is tainted or boosted by the experience of months and weeks of whispers and innuendos, of outright accusations and nasty internet campaigns.

The movie itself is a disappointment compared to the rich story which surrounds it because Don’t Worry Darling is a patchy work which is neither horrendous nor a masterpiece.

It’s a relatively unremarkable film that has a couple of phenomenal performances (neither of which belong to Harry Styles), a banging production design and some ambitious ideas.

It also didn’t know how to bring home those ideas in a way that was consistent with its strong and compelling first act. Plus, it was far more derivative of the likes of Stepford Wives and Rosemary’s Baby than it is original.

Don't Worry Darling has been the subject of off-screen drama. Picture: Warner Bros

At times, Don’t Worry Darling is great. A seductive, visual cornucopia of colour and glamour, popping with style and attitude in how it established the “ideal” community of Victory, where Florence Pugh’s Alice lives with her husband Jack (Styles).

Victory is, to some, a perfect town where the perfectly coiffured housewives live perfect lives. They spend the day keeping home for their husbands and then either lounging by the pool or at dance class.

But as Betty Friedan wrote of in The Feminine Mystique, and less nuanced but just as effectively portrayed in The Simpsons’ Cypress Creek episode, the gleam of that surface perfection hides a menacing truth.

These towns are not what they seem and there are many, many secrets, such as the mystery of Jack’s job and what exactly is “the Victory project” other than some boring, self-righteous rhetoric about progress and order.

When the town’s leaders, the charismatic Frank (Chris Pine) and his wife Shelley (Gemma Chan), talk about progress and safety, it rings hollow. Progress and order aren’t the easiest bedfellows, evolution requires confrontations and a sliver of chaos.

A menacing Chris Pine. Picture: Warner Bros

Maybe because Don’t Worry Darling is a thriller and maybe because it’s drawing on so many existing cultural tropes, you know that what Alice is being sold is a turkey.

The unease she feels, the questions she starts to ask and the surrealist experiences she begins to have all point to what you know is coming. Perhaps not the exact secret but a general vibe. 

Especially as Wilde and screenwriter Katie Silberman spend the seemingly endless middle act of the film having Pugh do her best Rosemary Woodhouse. 

Victory isn’t hiding a satanic cult trying to birth the devil’s baby or a Hank Scorpio supervillain lair, but the “truth” of its foundation is no less pernicious, tapping directly into contemporary social movements. 

Wilde’s directorial debut, Booksmart, was perfect when it came to the tone – a riotously fun and clever comedy about two teenage girls determined to live it up on their final night of high school.

Booksmart was a confident effort from a first-timer and while Don’t Worry Darling was bolder, a lot of its bigger swings didn’t connect, particularly in the back half when the themes ramped up.

Wilde is clearly a good director at many aspects of her job, including eliciting a fantastic performance from the preternaturally gifted Pugh. No matter what happened on that set, whatever the relationship supposedly was or wasn’t between director and star, there’s no doubt that the two worked fabulously together for that performance.

Olivia Wilde directed and stars in Don’t Worry Darling. Picture: Warner Bros

Pine is equally enthralling as the charming but untrustworthy Frank and a worthy scene partner to Pugh.

Who’s not is Styles, who really struggles as the drama escalates – when his character needs to be more than a doting husband, Styles reminds us that’s he’s not a trained actor. He’s adequate for someone with little experience behind him but he’s operating at maybe three different levels when everyone around him is doing 17. 

Don’t Worry Darling is initially captivating because of all that it promised but when it devolves into little more than a few nods to stronger, more memorable predecessors, it becomes victim to its own ambitions and set-up. 

If it weren’t for all the off-screen drama, Don’t Worry Darling would’ve barely made a blip in the mainstream cinema culture of 2022, instead of being talked about as one of the biggest movies of the year. 

It’s been both a blessing and a curse. 

Rating: 2.5/5

Don’t Worry Darling is in cinemas now