As David Lynch once famously said about suburban life “I discovered that if one looks a little closer at this beautiful world, there are always red ants underneath”, which is a quote that is often brought out when any work of literature is produced in which an artist is looking at the broken promises of suburbia, much in the same way that Thomas Pynchon’s quote that “paranoia is the garlic in life’s kitchen – you can never have too much” is used when discussing any film that centres on the subject of neuroses borne from the bureaucratic control of the institution. However, these are relevant to many discussions, especially when we are looking at one of the rare examples of them converging in describing a single work, namely Don’t Worry Darling, the sophomore directorial effort from Olivia Wilde, who is steadily establishing herself as one of the most exciting names in contemporary filmmaking, and someone whose work proves that she has a significant amount of talent. Working from a screenplay written by Katie Silberman, and originally conceived by Carey Van Dyke and Shane Van Dyke, the film is a brilliantly subversive and twisted descent into the darker side of the 1950s, a period that has been radically romanticized by those who yearn for those simpler, more carefree days, and it doesn’t take too long for us to realize that nothing is what it seems, with Wilde taking us on a bewildering journey into the past – or what appears to be the past, which is the crucial aspect that somehow makes Don’t Worry Darling one of the year’s most unconventional films, a psychological thriller that offers us much more complexity and nuance that we’d initially imagine, and enough to have us walk away feeling suitably unsettled and profoundly confused, which is the currency that is most useful in terms of this specific story.

Don’t Worry Darling is a film that stands in firm and steadfast opposition to the concept of the idyllic way of life that was supposedly promised by the American Dream – and there are few ways to explore this better than in a film set in the 1950s, which is often seen as the quintessential era for the supposed idealistic domestic life – the Second World War was now a distant memory, the country was recovering to the point of being incredible prosperous, and society was starting to become more open-minded about their identities, whether in regards to gender or sexuality, meaning that there was more efforts towards some kind of progress, even if only slowly. Of course, we know that this is just drawn straight from a Norman Rockwell painting that proposed an ideal version without actually reflecting with any sense of authenticity or even slight plausibility, since in reality, the 1950s were plagued with racism, domestic violence and (most importantly for this discussion) massive amounts of paranoia, mainly caused by the Red Scare, with every American feeling like it was their civic duty to help prevent the rise of communism in the country, which plays a small but pivotal role in the development of this film and its often bold ideas. These ideas are all embedded deep within Don’t Worry Darling, which is a film that feels like it is drawn from the most harrowing side of history, one in which the most horrifying experiences don’t come from outside, but instead flourish from the most seemingly peaceful domestic situations, which is playfully utilized by Wilde and her cohorts in the construction of this challenging thriller that combines peculiar satire with the kind of deeply unsettling storytelling that keeps us engaged and intrigued by the numerous secrets that linger beneath the surface of the film.

As is often the case with more challenging films, its important to situate Don’t Worry Darling into a specific milieu, in order to at least begin to make sense of the film as a whole, even if it is slightly more difficult to find a direct category in which it fits. This is clearly a film inspired by the kind of twisted satires that intend to lampoon suburban life – The Stepford Wives in particular looms large throughout the film and a clear influence, as does Frank Perry’s Diary of a Mad Housewife and does American Beauty, at least in how they show a darker side of suburbia. Something about the era in which the film is set is also profoundly interesting, and Wilde uses the opportunity to create something both narratively and visually distinct. If we start to unpack the story itself, we can see where a lot of the criticisms come from – Don’t Worry Darling is a bewildering film that doesn’t make too much sense until we reach the climactic twist, where everything starts to fall into place. For some, this could help explain the more off-kilter aspects of the story, while others will definitely find it far too absurd for a film that was already rather outrageous from its first moments. However, there was not anything to suggest that Wilde or anyone else involved were aiming for realism, instead choosing this absolutely deranged premise that could either be an absolute chore, or the foundation for a potential cult classic – but regardless of where we fall on its purpose, it’s difficult to argue that Don’t Worry Darling achieved it in an abundance, since there are many wild ideas pulsating beneath the film, and while not all of them are neatly resolved (and perhaps a tighter script may have allowed for a more concise resolution to some of the bolder ideas), the film is notable precisely because of how frequently it flirts with going off the rails, but never quite does, maintaining a level of control that seems almost intentional in how it playfully takes viewers on this confounding journey.

In theory, the cast of Don’t Worry Darling should be its strongest asset – after all, having a film with as bold a premise as this could only work if the right actors were put in charge of bringing these strange ideas to the screen. Many performers tend to struggle when it comes to period pieces, since they often rely too heavily on modern sensibilities and can’t convincingly play characters from the past without feeling like they’re contemporary actors transplanted into this specific era. This is unfortunately the case with both Florence Pugh and Harry Styles, neither of which seem to be particularly adept at capturing the ennui of a suburban couple in the 1950s – but this is quickly resolved by the time we reach the twist, which helps rationalize not only their casting, but their acting style, which we are led to believe was a flaw, but was actually one of the smartest pieces of characterization we’ve seen recently. Pugh in particular manages to be quite a marvel – her performance is layered with fear, anxiety and the disgruntled frustration of being trapped in a cycle of domesticity, which would normally be seen as a dream life for many people, but turns out to be beyond challenging for her, which is explained later in the film. Styles does his best, but he is still ultimately an amateur actor who has seemingly done very little work to hone the craft of acting, which leads to several moments where he is the source of a lot of unintentional humour. Mercifully, Wilde is not oblivious to these flaws, and does structure the film in such a way that these shortcomings are actually assimilated into the plot – he’s not entirely untalented, so there’s still hope for him as an actor, granted he is willing to put in the work. Chris Pine, Gemma Chan and Wilde herself populate the supporting cast, playing residents of this idyllic suburb, each one deeply terrifying in their own way. Like with the plot, suspension of disbelief is vital to fully understand the approach being taken with these characters and the actors who might play to the rafters, but all with a strong purpose.

Disregarding the narrative, which certainly has its problems that may cause each individual viewer’s mileage to vary in terms of how we respond to the film, it is difficult to deny the effort that went into constructing this world. Don’t Worry Darling puts a lot of work into creating this fictional world, taking us back to the 1950s in a way that feels very peculiar but undeniably compelling. Accuracy is not particularly important here, especially since we soon come to learn the sinister secrets of this town, after which we begin to notice the small details that we missed earlier in the film. Victory Park (which is marked with an enormous “V” at the entrance, implying that Pynchon and his distinctive piece of paranoid iconography was something of an influence, even if only marginally) is an approximation of what someone in the present era may imagine an idyllic town in the California desert may look like – bright colours, an over-abundance of symmetry and seemingly no logical connection to the rest of the world. These small absurdities are all purposeful, and Wilde seems to be relishing in gingerly placing these clues throughout the film, leading to a striking climax that is more demented than nearly anything we’ve seen in recent attempts to show the sordid underbelly of an era that is so often seen as ideal. There’s a precise artistry to Don’t Worry Darling that helps give it a much more enduring sense of self-awareness and intelligence, but it doesn’t make this clear until the very end, after which it descends into narrative chaos, the kind of carefully-curated pandemonium that feels oddly captivating, even when it is outright terrifying, which allows the film to skirt the boundary between satirical dark comedy and psychological horror, one of the more compelling surprises that lurk beneath the surface of this film.

Like the guide to cologne and perfumes that the domestic handbooks the characters in this film may use, the secrets at the heart of Don’t Worry Darling are not announced, but are rather discovered – Wilde places a lot of faith in the audience that we are going to be able to actively engage with the film, since this is far from a conventional experience, and expecting to passively observe this story is not wise. It may often take advantage of our curiosity, especially when it introduces various ideas that are not carried all the way to fruition (there could have been entire films spun out of the characters played by Pine and Timothy Simons, who are amongst the highlights of the film), and there are certain elements that may be frustrating, since they seem to exist without any logical reason – however, can we really expect perfection from a film that actively rebels against it? The social and cultural undercurrent is actually far more compelling than the surface-level components that we expect to be the subject of the satire. Don’t Worry Darling is not a film about the broken promises of the past, but rather the idealization of eras that have gone past and seemingly been consolidated into memory as being the image of flawless, carefree domesticity, and as this film gradually proclaims, there are several cracks that become clearer the closer we get to the epicentre of the romanticizing of bygone periods, and the dark secrets that begin to manifest the more we view the past as supposedly better than the present. This is not a film that is particularly easy to watch, but it feels invigorating and complex in ways that may be unorthodox, but are certainly far more compelling than a lot of criticism may lead you to believe. They say the grass is greener on the other side, but once we cross that boundary, we soon learn the secrets that lurk beneath the surface of the eras many of us look on as being ideal, when in reality they are as sordid and filled with misery and anxiety as the present moment, leading to a harrowing depiction of the past that feels both compelling and undeniably terrifying, in terms of both form and content.