DON'T WORRY DARLING: The Victory Project Loses Big

Okay y’all, let’s cut to the chase: I don’t think this movie is anywhere good enough for the amount of drama surrounding it. To be blunt, I’m going to eviscerate this movie, so let me go ahead and give my trademark disclaimer. The good thing about movies is that unless the content is horrible and offensive, whether a movie is good or bad is fully subjective. Just because I didn’t like it doesn’t necessarily make it a bad movie, and I’ll always encourage you to watch movies for yourself and form your own opinion.  

Moving on. 

I had to stifle laughter for the entire third act of this movie. And, I mean, I had to fully bury my face into my sweatshirt and bite my bottom lip to stifle laughter. I truly think there were good intentions for this movie, and I see what Olivia Wilde was going for. However, the execution just isn’t it, Sis. I know I’ve been avoiding spoilers in my current reviews, but I sincerely can’t write about my gripes without ruining the ending. I’m giving you the chance now to click away. After the picture of Florence Pugh below, I will IMMEDIATELY be jumping into spoilers. 

Okay, last chance. 

Alrighty, here we go. If you’re like me, you guessed from the trailer that the entire world of Don’t Worry Darling isn’t actually set in the 1950s and/or was a simulation. And, if you’re like me, and you guessed these things, you’d be correct. The entire world Florence Pugh’s Alice Chapman finds herself in is but a mere simulation because her husband, Harry Styles’s Jack Chapman, couldn’t handle the fact that his wife was a successful doctor, and he couldn’t hold down a job. Thus, like the POS these types of insecure, archaic men are, Jack knocks out Alice, restrains her to the bed, and keeps her in a simulation, where she lives the life of a 1950s housewife. 

Yeah. Let that sink in. 

Jack listens to some icky “manly man” podcasters who dictate the ideas of what a “man” should be. He joins the Victory Project and then RESTRAINS HIS WIFE AGAINST HER KNOWLEDGE OR WILL AND FORCES HER INTO A SIMULATION. Then, when she questions her reality in the simulation, she’s forced into electroshock therapy in the simulation. 

Another sweet little comedy nugget Don’t Worry Darling serves up is that Jack chooses to be British in the simulation, and somehow his American accent in the brief scenes from reality sounds more authentic than his real, British accent? Don’t ask me how it happened. I also wish I could find a picture of Jack in “real life” to show y’all; they pulled out everything they could think of outside of making Harry Styles “m’lady” to make him “conventionally unattractive.” 

Before the big reveal, there’s also a scene where he and Alice just scream and cry at each other in the car, and Jack cries like Captain Hammer in Dr. Horrible’s Sing-Along Blog, hence what started the aforementioned laughing. The aforementioned laughing continued as Olivia Wilde’s character, Bunny, reveals to Alice that not only does she know they’re in a simulation, but Bunny willingly chose this life because she lost her children…and then lets Alice know, sigh, if you die in the game, you die in real life. Now, it’s not those exact words, but it was close enough for me to shake my head and wave my hands.

There’s also an entire car chase scene, resulting in a car explosion usually seen in 80s action movies. The only thing missing was Florence Pugh looking at the camera and saying something like, “Way to blow” or “That was a gas” or “Was it good for you?” (I have more, but you get the picture). 

Another big thing that really bothers me about Don’t Worry Darling is how no part was really original. Throughout the entire film, I was comparing scenes to Suspiria, Get Out, Midsommar, etc… There wasn’t really anything I hadn’t seen before. And honestly, there were a couple scenes a little too similar to things I’d seen before. 

I know I’ve spent paragraphs obliterating Don’t Worry Darling, but believe me when I say, I sincerely wanted to like it. I was hoping the drama wasn’t a diversion tactic, and that my theory wasn’t right ⸺ I honestly love when a movie proves me wrong. I’m not too proud to eat my words because we all know I have a lot of them. But, the only thing this movie made me eat was my popcorn (while watching Harry Styles eat out Florence Pugh). 

Don’t Worry Darling: There are much better movies out right now to go see.