Review Tuesday: Compliance (2012)

 

Compliance

Terrible things happen to a nineteen year old woman who works at a fast food joint when the manager gets a call from someone saying he's from the police. 

The wife was looking to watch a horror movie and came across this movie. She selected this one because it was rated R and got pretty good reviews.  

It starts off with a group of youngsters who work at the local fast food joint getting ready for a busy Friday. In the middle of the lunch rush a man called saying he was a police officer who had the regional manager on hold on one line and a theft victim right next to him.His surveillance team had evidence that corroborates the victims story: Becky (played by Dreama Walker) stole cash from a customer's purse. Of course the had to comply with the police, didn't she? The rest of the movie, which seemed to take course over a period 6 - 8 hours, was about how members of the staff and even the manager's boyfriend all took turns sexually abusing the poor innocent girl. The most unfortunate part was that no one that you question authority. He said he was a cop after-all?  

This movie was deeply disturbing to me on several levels. The willingness of people to blindly comply with the wishes of some perceived authority figure even if it seems uncalled for, illegal, and, especially, immoral to do. This guy was NOT a cop, his act wasn't even good, with plenty of holes in his story, it defies logic that anyone would be such a fool to go along with this ruse. But you might think, well, it's just a movie. This movie is based on a true story. Who knows how close it follows the real item, who knows? What I do know is that people get phone calls everyday from frauds trying to pull a fast one. It might be someone trying to sell you an extended warranty on your car, or selling additional coverage for your Medicare insurance, or someone claiming to be an IRS agent and wants your social security number and bank accounts. (Those are just some examples of scams I know about, there are plenty of others.) So the question is, who is foolish enough to honor the wishes of some official without any proof? 

I found this to be a very disturbing, yet compelling film that exposes the naivete of modern society and the way people will blindly take orders from a higher power regardless of how cruel and barbaric it may seem.It assaulted my sensibilities. 

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