There’s A Fine Line Between Paradise and Hell: Don’t Worry Darling

When the grandsons of Dick Van Dyke come up with a story about the glorious mid-century era, perhaps one is quick to take their view on the period to heart. For Shane and Carey Van Dyke undeniably saw enough episodes of The Dick Van Dyke Show to get a sense of how life at the Victory Project could be, with New Rochelle perhaps acting as the primary source of inspiration for such an environment, as opposed to the “big city” (what some like to call New York) where Rob Petrie worked. Like Mad Men’s Betty Draper (January Jones) perched upstate in an Ossining ivory tower, so, too, was Laura Petrie (Mary Tyler Moore). Of course, The Dick Van Dyke Show was meant to highlight a more “progressive” stage of gender politics by the lone virtue of Rob working in television.

Yet a large degree of that was already achieved with the true pioneer of TV that was I Love Lucy. In many respects, Lucy Ricardo (Lucille Ball) was more rebellious than the women of today. After all, she would always, always put her own needs and desires above so-called social mores—living for the scheme that might effectively take her own husband “down” by proving that she had more talent than he did. And, in truth, apart from the deliberately off-key singing, that wasn’t necessarily a delusion. Just watch any dance number she ever infiltrated her way into. The show, however, is now frequently prone to being viewed as part of the ephemera of a misogyny-ridden time. Chauvinism that was never questioned but instead taken as “par for the course” of being a woman. After all, they let all the “little girls” play at being men for long enough during the war, didn’t they? Maybe that’s where men “went wrong” in the first place: “giving” women too much of a taste of freedom.

But they certainly made up for that false sense of independence during the decades of what would be called the “post-war boom.” A boom that included birthing as well (hence the generational name “baby boomers”). The 1950s made up most of this boom and appears to be the era in which Don’t Worry Darling is set. Though the instant a Black resident appears onscreen and the whites don’t start freaking out, it’s pretty obvious this is not your ordinary 1950s setup. Written by Katie Silberman (who, again, based it on the story idea and script of Dick Van Dyke’s grandkids), the film finds Olivia Wilde reteaming with the screenwriter after their work together on 2019’s Booksmart. With the latter marking Wilde’s directorial debut, Don’t Worry Darling hasn’t been as easy to secure accolades for. Not just because, if you poke too much at the plot holes, the whole thing comes apart, but because there’s been so much negative attention surrounding the press for it. And yet, what is it they say?: all press is good press (unless you’re Madonna in 1993 and Body of Evidence is released as a box office bomb).

That would appear to be the case based on a projection of the film to make just over twenty million dollars during opening weekend. What might happen after that could very well be a plummet in interest (therefore, receipts), but, nonetheless, it’s not a bad start considering all the odds stacked against it. Including a rather blasé leading lady, who seems to have no interest in promoting it, perhaps under the guise of “letting the work speak for itself.” And it does in terms of Pugh’s acting, which always shines at its best when she’s provided with a few crying/“hysterics” scenes. Indeed, Don’t Worry Darling gives Midsommar a run for its money in that regard. Alas, it can’t quite outdo the many films it culls from, particularly The Stepford Wives (the 2004 remake of which was and is often underrated). Other films Wilde was open about citing as overt influences included The Truman Show, The Matrix and Inception.

What she left out was also a TV show influence (released around the time Don’t Worry Darling was still in production): WandaVision. In fact, despite Harry Styles’ claims to the contrary, so much about this movie feels like it would have been better suited to the medium of television, whether a limited series or a few seasons. At least that way, Wilde and Silberman would have been afforded more time to better detail the parameters of the universe they’re seeking to create. In much the same way that Frank (Chris Pine) wishes to do the same with “the Victory Project,” a coded term that alludes to something more sinister beneath the surface of the remote, isolated development that is Victory, California. Recognizable immediately to others as Palm Springs. For California is nothing if not a master in displaying the peak of suburban landscapes.

As for the “leader” of this one, Wilde was sure to mention that the inspiration for Frank came from Jordan Peterson, a man she described happily as a “pseudo-intellectual hero to the incel community.” That characterization alone ought to be an instant tip-off to most about where the plot of this movie is going to end up. Complete with lines from Frank like, “What is the enemy of progress? Chaos.” Chaos meaning, to most conservative males, the idea of anyone straying off the overly beaten path of kowtowing to so-called white male supremacy. It’s obvious in this moment in particular that Wilde is unabashedly having a laugh at Peterson, whose own bestselling book is called 12 Rules for Life: An Antidote to Chaos. But there is no antidote to the chaos that comes when Alice (Pugh) begins to delve deeper into “what lies beneath” Victory.

It all starts at the party where Frank talks shit about chaos, interrupted by Ted’s (Ari’el Stachel) wife, Margaret (KiKi Layne, taking over Dakota Johnson after she dropped out of the project). Appearing onto the scene to “blemish” it with her “hysteria,” she asks in a daze, “What are we doing here?” This serves as the proverbial “get out” moment—one that Alice chooses to ignore because she, like Jack, wants to help “make the dream real.”

As it turns out, of course, the “dream” is more nightmare than anything else, with Alice often having actual nightmarish visions of synchronized dancers (all of whom resemble a ghoulish Marilyn Monroe) in the spirit of iconic Busby Berkeley scenes. It mirrors Alice’s own essentially obligatory ballet class, where she’s expected to repeat a mantra about grace and control. Both of which she relinquishes one afternoon when she sees a plane crash after it appears to touch against some kind of invisible forcefield (here, again, thoughts of WandaVision come to mind). From this moment forward, Don’t Worry Darling presents a deliberately bifurcated view of the assumed era: one that glamorizes it (which is presumably why Dita Von Teese shows up) and one that spotlights it for the subjugating-to-women hell hole that it was.

Even someone as “free-spirited” (another term for “she’s got a mouth on her”) as Wilde’s character (because she’s almost fully Orson Welles’ing it in this) ends up suppressed by a husband so lackluster. And yes, Nick Kroll as Dean is a totally throwaway character who has no real place in the movie and could have been portrayed by pretty much any and everyone else for all his lack of personality in it. Giving Wilde plenty of opportunity to glow as the “better half” of the couple. Yet she reveals her true colors during the climax of the third act. One that speaks to something she told Stephen Colbert during her promotional interview with him: that she could easily be seduced into living in a place like Victory. Which she admits is especially bad because she’s a woman—and yet, wasn’t it so much “easier” when we all had our “roles,” all knew our “places”? Lived in a “bubble” that was encouraged by American society at that time. That’s the “allure” of a period in history that has been so dissected in film it has become a genre unto itself (often with sci-fi, “magical” elements like the ones in Pleasantville).

Yet Wilde doesn’t leave out the dystopian/horror facets she wishes to convey either. Most notably when there is an A Clockwork Orange-reminiscent scene involving eyes being forced to stay open with metal gadgetry. Because one must watch the propaganda in order to be brainwashed by it, n’est-ce pas? This includes the “culture” of incels who believe what they want to, thanks to cultivating their own online “reality” (tellingly, that’s part of why the movie’s tag line is: “Are you ready to live the life you deserve?”).

And regardless of what is held up to such ilk as objective reality (believe it or not, there is such a thing), no amount of “evidence” can change what they think or feel. As Milton wrote, “A mind not to be chang’d by Place or Time. The mind is its own place, and in itself can make a Heav’n of Hell, a Hell of Heav’n.” That is, fundamentally, the crux of what Don’t Worry Darling addresses in terms of gender-conforming “norms” and expectations that have only really recently begun to be shattered. And yet, not quite, considering the amount of criticism Wilde has gotten not for her work, but the “controversy” surrounding it.