[Event Review] Popcorn Frights Film Festival: Compulsus (2022)

“I like a woman upright and seething.” 

Tara Thorne’s feature debut Compulsus (2022), part of Popcorn Frights film fest, is a tense and emotional, hard look at rape culture and violence against women and feminine people. Wally (Lesley Smith) is a poet and technical writer who enjoys going out with her female friends Mackenzie (Koumbie) and Kinnon (Kathryn McCormack). Wally is a lesbian, and she doesn’t have horror stories about dating men, but her friends do. Over drinks, they often share anecdotes of abuse and misogyny which have happened to them or other women they know. Wally is worried about her sister Dev (Hilary Adams), who may be in an abusive or at least controlling relationship with her husband. At the same time, Wally is starting a relationship with a bisexual woman, Lou (Kathleen Dorian), who has horror stories of her own. Wally is tired of hearing about these horrors happening to women, and no justice being done. She takes matters into her own hands, and goes vigilante, starting an anonymous service to beat the shit out of men who have hurt women.

There may be many rape revenge movies, but none of them are like this. This is a story in the style of rape revenge, but there’s no rape and almost no violence against women shown onscreen. Many similar stories focus on the men perpetrating the violence, and there is a place for those stories, but Compulsus makes the story entirely about women. A man’s face is never shown, and all the Bad Men, as they are credited (played by James MacLean) are in a jean jacket and hooded sweatshirt. Men are a monolith in the film, which makes the audience confront what they believe about “yes all men” vs. “not all men.” Men’s names are spoken by the cast, but censored in the film, so the audience never even knows a man’s name. In Compulsus, men are perpetrators of violence, and nothing more, and the women are characterized. That’s a radical approach, and it may turn off some viewers, but it’s bold and confronts the audience in a way that makes the viewer engage.

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Gendered violence is an uncomfortable topic, as it should be. The film raises questions about how we discuss sexual assault and violence against femininity and women. While Compulsus does not directly address non-binary people or genders other than male or female, it nods in that direction with the characters’ names. All the women have names that are gender neutral. This could be to acknowledge that issues are more complicated than just “male and female.” It is true that women are more likely to experience violence perpetrated by men, and the film chooses to spend time on this topic. It keeps its scope manageable to address a very real and dangerous concern. Wally relies on men not looking out for their own safety and being too embarrassed to report their assault, which are both realistic problems.

It’s a gorgeous film, with cinematography and sound design that add to the tension and beauty. In the first act, before Wally goes vigilante, there are long, slow shots of her looking down the street, getting a sense of her surroundings before she walks home from the bar. The amount of time those shots are held on a seemingly quiet and harmless street, felt true to the experience of being a woman responsible for her own safety, when you can’t necessarily rely on the world for help. Similarly, there is a scene in which Wally is being followed, and the camera is looking backwards over her shoulder and shaking along with her. It evokes the exact feeling of panic when you realize you are being followed and have to make a plan. This is in contrast to the feelings of power portrayed by Wally later, such as the obvious rush she gets from washing her bloody knuckles, and the chills evoked by her second poem recited in the film.  

Compulsus is a film that should be analyzed and digested, not taken lightly or at face-value. The gender commentary is not perfect - how could it be, with a story to tell in eighty minutes? - but it will spark important conversations that we cannot afford to ignore. Do not miss this tense and thoughtful thriller!

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