Review of ‘Don’t worry dear’, idyllic residential neighborhood

Alice and Jack, the leading couple in ‘Don’t worry, dear’ by Olivia Wilde, live in one of those idyllic residential neighborhoods that American cinema and television have turned into a privileged setting for the American dream. The couple is British, but the “suburbial” paradise of the United States of the 1950s seems to suit them perfectly. His life passes between a feast of hedonism and peace… until paradise begins to reveal strange signs. As was the case with the ear that the protagonist of David Lynch’s ‘Blue Velvet’ discovered in her patio, Alice (Florence Pugh) begins to find anomalous elements in the neat canvas of her perfect existence: a topless woman at a private party, an overly hostile response on the part of a friend, the hint of alienation perceived in the stunned face of a colleague… Indications that this Edenic world, in which order prevails and where world news does not reach, could be hiding something sinister. Could this sweet-tasting, pastel-colored happiness be an illusion, a farce?

The premise of Wilde’s new film has its roots in a long genealogy of allegories with which Hollywood cinema has questioned the foundations of the Yankee imaginary. First it was the horror movies of the 1950s that evoked the fear of nuclear catastrophe. Later, in the 1970s, filmmakers such as Alan J. Pakula or Francis Ford Coppola used the coordinates of the thriller to portray the paranoia that consumed a country afflicted by the Watergate Affair. Then, in the 1990s, the advent of digital simulacra in the postmodern era spawned a wave of fables about the fallacies of consumer society, from ‘The Truman Show’ to ‘The Matrix’, all the way to ‘The Forest ‘ by M. Night Shyamalan. And now, what do the anti-system allegories of the North American audiovisual respond to? The answer must be sought, surely, in the awakening generated, in social consciousness, by movements such as #MeToo or #BlackLivesMatter. Thus, in the wake of a series like ‘Scarlet Witch and Vision’, a thriller like Edgar Wright’s ‘Last Night in Soho’ or historical fiction like Ridley Scott’s ‘The Last Duel’, ‘Don’t worry, dear’ focuses on the confusion generated in patriarchy by a society that demands equality.

charging furiously at him Make America Great Again Donald Trump, Wilde stages a glossy horror tale in which evil hides behind the mask of optimism and glamour. An operation of pop agitation in which the actress-director makes use of the interpretive talent of the always in tune Florence Pugh, who exudes elegance in the skin of a “desperate woman” and then uncovers her most distressed face – that wonderful expression of a sad emoticon –. On his side, ex-One Direction Harry Styles fulfills his mission as a man dedicated, in equal parts, to married love and personal success. Some good performances that become the greatest virtue of a film that, in its central section, is about to be absorbed by its own premise: the creation of an artificial and bland universe. It is possible to question Wilde’s sense of cinematographic rhythm (less inspired than in ‘Super nerds’), and the film’s sweet-gloomy imagery may be somewhat trite, but it is impossible to question the opportune way in which ‘Don’t worry, my dear’ dialogues with a reality in which the desire for social progress collides with the most recalcitrant conservatism.

For those interested in the sinister back room of the American dream

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DATA SHEET

Address: Olivia Wilde Interpreters: Florence Pugh, Harry Styles, Olivia Wilde, Gemma Chan, Chris Pine Country: USA Year: 2022 Release date: 09-23-2022 Gender: thriller Script: Katie Silberman, Carey Van Dyke, Shane Van Dyke Duration: 122 minutes

Synopsis: Alice (Pugh) and Jack (Styles) are lucky enough to live in the idealized community of Victoria, an experimental company town where the men who work for the top-secret Project Victoria live with their families. CEO Frank (Pine), corporate visionary and Motivational Lifestyle Coach, CEO Frank (Pine)’s optimism for the lifestyle of society in the 1950s anchors all the utopian aspects of daily life and unites in the wilderness. But when cracks begin to appear in her idyllic life, exposing glimpses of something far more sinister than lurks beneath the alluring facade, Alice can’t help but wonder exactly what they’re doing in Victoria, and why.