DVD Review: ‘Compliance’ Will Most Certainly Piss You Off

Posted By: Alexon: February 19, 2013In: DVD/Blu-Ray ReviewsNo Comments

At the 2012 Sundance Film Festival, it wasn’t just the horror movie V/H/S that got audiences riled up, the provocative drama Compliance was another, somewhat controversial, title that had the audience yelling and full of rage. This review, against my principles, will contain spoilers as the nature of the film makes it necessary to do so.

The sophomore effort from director Craig Zobel was inspired by true events called the strip search prank call scam that took place in 2004. In Compliance, an uptight fast food manager named Sandra (Ann Dowd) is working during a busy afternoon at the restaurant when she receives a call from a police officer saying that one of her young, attractive employees named Becky (Dreama Walker) has stolen money out of a woman’s purse. After explaining the situation to Sandra, Sandra isolates Becky from the rest of the employees convinced that she is doing the right thing, following the instructions that the officer gives her over the phone starting with questioning, then moving on to a strip search and, well, let’s just say the film rolls onward from there.

Compliance is definitely a movie that will frustrate you at the very least and will likely get most people riled up. The main reason is because it aims to show how naive and ignorant our society really is, the fact that anyone would just blindly believe that someone on the other end of a phone line is a police officer makes me cringe. The officer claims that Becky stole money and yet all of her fellow employees know she didn’t, rather than checking the security tapes, Sandra agrees to listen to the officer. When he threatens to bring Becky downtown, that’s when Becky submits to the will of Sandra but have any of these people ever heard of a cop asking people to make citizens arrests, to conduct strip searches and to keep them naked all afternoon? When red flags go up in everyone’s heads except the initially skeptical manager, it makes you wonder how many people in power lack intelligence or a basic understanding of society’s standards, principles and rights.

As the tension and frustration builds throughout the film, so do the requests of the officer. There is a point when Sandra asks her fiancé-to-be to watch Becky as she runs the restaurant during its busy hours. Even though he is buzzed, he agrees to do this and talks with the cop. Eventually the cop says that Becky needs to be punished and that he should spank her bare bottom. Originally off put and ready to leave, Sandra convinces her husband to stay and listen to the officer despite not knowing what’s about to happen. Yes, it’s sexual assault at that point and it is also at that point in which both people, the submissive Beck and her watchman should know that this can’t be for real, but Becky’s will to defend herself anymore has dropped significantly and, like a foreign girl forced into prostitution, receives her spanking but what follows that will just blow your mind.

In the end, things eventually take their rightful course but learning about the life of the man on the other end of the phone line and the number of reports of incidents like this is not only creepy, but partially mind-blowing. It makes me a little sick knowing there are people out there that like to play these games but it makes me 1000 times sicker knowing that there are people who would actually buy into this game. Education or not, it’s never good when people with authority lack basic common sense and don’t heed the advice of others and Compliance makes damn sure that this message gets through to you.

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