After Call the Midwife and Killing Eve, the Londoner has turned director with her own tale of violent female revenge
When the camera follows a young woman as she staggers around a bar, slurring her words, she is conventionally marked out as a victim. A judgmental film director might even indicate she is deserving of scorn. But what if this vulnerable target is actually the one deciding who really deserves what – and then meting out her own brutal form of justice? This is the subversive premise of the directorial debut from the
British actress, screenwriter and author Emerald Fennell.
Her film, Promising Young Woman, is released next month and opens with scenes that show Cassie Thomas, a medical school dropout played by Carey Mulligan, apparently indulging in just the sort of self-destructive alcoholic behaviour seen recently from other modern anti-heroines, such as Rachel in The Girl on the Train, or the eponymous Daphne in the admired off-beat British film of 2017. The difference this time is that Cassie has been weaponised by a damaging experience in her past. And although she is clinging on to a job in a coffee shop and still living with her parents at 30, she is no longer anyone’s victim. The result, according to the Telegraph’s Robbie Collin is a “wild and righteous provocation” of a film.