ASKING FOR IT
US, 2021, 97 minutes, Colour.
Kiersey Clemens, Vanessa Hudgens, Alexandra Shipp, Ezra Miller, Gaborey Sidibe, Radha Mitchell, Leslie Stratton, Luke Hemsworth, David Patrick Kelly, Demetrius Ship Jr.
Directed by Eamon O'Rourke.
This is a film with an unpleasant theme, brutality and violence by men, victimisation of women, women rising for retaliation.
The title indicates an attitude which some men take in terms of relating to women, sexually. At the core of this film is the dramatisation of a movement, Men for Men, meetings shown, slogans yelled, extreme macho male dominance. Ezra Miller plays the lead, fanatical yet sometimes coldly calculating, a strong presence at the Men for Men meetings. However, he is in collusion with the local sheriff, David Patrick Kelly, who is running a human trafficking organisation, abducting women, putting them on boats, $10,000 for each.
With this ugly portrayal of groups of young men, drinking, swaggering, little sense of decency, the portrayal of the women in the film can be understood, sympathised with.
The focus here is on a young girl, Joey, waitressing, urged to look for a better future, supported at home, who goes to a party, invited by a young man going to college – who then rapes her. Needless to say, it has a devastating effect on her while he, calmly, goes on his way.
Joey meets a regular customer at the diner where she works who invites her into conversation, to meet a number of her friends. While Joey is wary, she gets caught up with a number of the friends. They belong to a collective of women, victimised women, taking matters into their own hands, to wreak some kind of vengeance on abusive men. They have a central meeting place, a cafe, and a leader played by Radha Mitchell. There is quite a variety of women in the group and they go to a centre, on the outskirts of town, set up by refugees from the city, men and women, a kind of collective where they support one another.
The film shows the activities of the women. There are protests. There are demonstrations. There are fights. One complication is the past relationship of the leader in her study days, with the policeman (Luke Hemsworth) who is upholding the law but sympathetic to the women, with a rather daft assistant, who comes to the centre, offering support, especially in the confrontation with the corrupt sheriff.
Joey encounters her rapist, confronts him, he backing down, she humiliating him, making him admit the truth.
However, matters are not easy with the whole group, the corrupt sheriff and other police, fights, shootouts, deaths, Joey been taken, the possibility of her being trafficked. The leader is also shot dead.
While Joey returns quietly home, the audience has been immersed in the ugliness of the Men for Men meetings, the macho bravado, the violence, and made to look at this through the eyes of the protesting women.
