She is known as Camilla Parker Bowles from the series “The Crown”. With her directorial debut, Emerald Fennell caused a sensation at the Oscars.
New York – British actress Carey Mulligan usually plays easily lost characters with a contemporary twist.
She was the alleged adulteress Daisy at the side of Leonardo DiCaprio in “The Great Gatsby”, the insecure sister of Michael Fassbender in the sex drama “Shame” or the misplaced wife of Jake Gyllenhaal in the underrated 1960s zeitgeist tableau “Wildlife” “.
Even if the roles at her side are often high-profile, Mulligan has an excellent reputation for making each of her films better. Now “Promising Young Woman” is coming to German cinemas and in it the 36-year-old is clearly cast against the grain. That didn’t detract from the jubilation for their performance. She got her second nomination for an Oscar for the revenge thriller full of black humor.
At the beginning of the almost two-hour film, Mulligan can be seen in a bar, drunk, apparently in need of protection: Cassandra “Cassie” Thomas thus attracts the attention of men who are often encouraged by their suit-wearing buddies, but come across as gallant. Often enough, one of them brings Cassie home and then tries to sexually assault her after all. The men realize their problem too late: the woman has only pretended to be drunk and is out for retribution.
The directorial debut of the only 35-year-old Emerald Fennell asks whether it is really true that most men are “good boys” and where the boundaries between good and bad are crossed. She also wrote the script and won an Oscar for the material that goes with the “Me Too” zeitgeist.
Despite the often gaudy staging, Fennell’s film is not clumsy and exaggerated, but always balanced, for example when you can see how lost the main character acts – and that it is not always clear even when a supposedly well-meaning college friend enters Cassie’s life whose behavior and when it crosses boundaries.
This Ryan is played by comedian Bo Burnham, who recently received very positive reviews with a pandemic special on Netflix. Just like Mulligan, he is cast against his usual image and that is also good for the film – even if “Promising Young Woman” could have used a pinch of more courage towards the end.
Promising Young Woman, USA/England 2020, 108 Min., FSK ab 16, von Emerald Fennell, mit Carey Mulligan, Bo Burnham, Jennifer Coolidge, Laverne Cox dpa
