From the mind of Olivia Wilde, the popular television and film actor, comes Don’t Worry Darling, a thriller/drama about “an experimental company town that houses the men who work on a top-secret project,” according to Metacritic.
The film, released Sept. 23, has a runtime of two hours and three minutes and stars British pop singer, Harry Styles, along with Florence Pugh, star of films such as Lady Macbeth and Black Widow. This is Styles’ second full movie after 2017’s Dunkirk.
Don’t Worry Darling was a highly anticipated film even though its production came with a flurry of drama. After the movie’s 2019 announcement, Wilde cast Pugh as the lead, Alice Chambers, with Shia LaBeouf as her husband, Jack Chambers. However, in 2020, LaBeouf left the film and Styles filled the role. The problems started to arise when PEOPLE magazine confirmed that Wilde had fired LaBeouf from the film, contradicting his previous statements about quitting due to a scheduling conflict.
The film itself is set in the 1950s in a town called Victory. As stated before, Victory is a town with members inside working on a secret project. In this town, everything seems as perfect as can be, but once Alice Chambers (Pugh) starts to question life in Victory, things begin to change for the worse.
Don’t Worry Darling checks all the boxes for a well-made psychological thriller: a solid storyline, a quality cast of actors, a good hair-raising score to accompany the action, and a chilling resolution that leaves viewers questioning everything.
Even though Don’t Worry Darling isn’t the best movie ever by far — or even the best thriller — it still proves to be a well-rounded film that is worth going to see on the big screen. Considering everything about the film, good and bad, Don’t Worry Darling has earned itself a 4/5.