Audiences got into heated discussions at some early screenings of “Compliance,” including combative Q&As at Sundance 2012, and there were walkouts reported opening weekend in Los Angeles and New York. It’s a provocative pressure-cooker of a movie that finds an effective, thriller-style narrative to dramatize perennially pertinent subjects about societal control, peer pressure and caving in to authoritarian behavior. At a Chick-fil-A-like fast-food restaurant (“ChickWich”), a man (Pat Healy) calls, claiming to be a cop, accusing cashier Becky (Dreama Walker) of stealing money from a customer. The middle-aged manager, Sandra (Ann Dowd) is told to help the officer, and to interrogate Becky in increasingly invasive ways. It gets worse. Then it gets worse. Then… The taut, economical script is not a tract: it’s a horror movie that unfolds through a single work shift, and you can understand why it would drive some viewers out into the aisles. Writer-director Craig Zobel says that newspaper reports of similar, seemingly unlikely pranks, as well as studies like the Milgram psychology experiments, inspired him to write the film after several larger projects went astray. Talking to him recently, Zobel said that the subject scared him enough that he had to pursue the film, and he wanted to make it as concentrated a story and production as he could. “Compliance” is a potent, terrifying portrait of corporate authority as much as of potentially awful human behavior. Are the characters, or the setting, most frightening? The potential for ready obeisance in all sorts of modern-day circumstances leave a metallic tang in the mouth: even without seeing the uniform of the inquisitor, the characters believe. Zobel, who’s from the Atlanta area, rejects the assertion some have made that he condescends to the working class, noting that much of that criticism comes from the North, from reviewers who are far removed from the working class. The characters aren’t stupid: they’re worn weary, and we live in their world as well. 90m. (Ray Pride)
“Compliance” opens Friday at Landmark Century. A trailer is below.
Ray Pride is Newcity’s Senior Editor and Film Critic. He is a contributing editor of Filmmaker magazine.
Ray’s history of Chicago Ghost Signs is planned for publication next year. Previews of the project are on Twitter and on Instagram. More photography on Instagram.
Seeing The Elephant: A Review Of Babylon The boisterous, brawling yet melancholy "Babylon," is a variation on film history, but more drawing for drama. It's gaudy and mean, celebratory and sorrowful.
Heart: A Review of Soul The real world is soulful, too, in Pixar's bountiful life of the mind.
Uncanny Ally: A Review Of M3GAN "M3GAN" sells itself in its first handful of seconds in how it introduces the handiwork of roboticist Gemma (Allison Williams, "Get Out") and her present product, PurrPetual Petz from Funki.
Fine Line: A Review Of Shortcomings It's a season for the comeuppance of a curmudgeon in Randall Park's smart, biting "Shortcomings," adapted by Adrian Tomine from his graphic novel of the same name.
RECOMMENDED
