Douglas Smith Archives

Review: ‘All the Lost Ones,’ starring Jasmine Mathews, Douglas Smith, Vinessa Antoine, Lochlyn Munro, Matthew Finlan, Anthony Grant, Sheila McCarthy and Devon Sawa

May 22, 2025

by Carla Hay

Douglas Smith, Jasmine Mathews and Vinessa Antoine in “All the Lost Ones” (Photo courtesy of Epic Pictures)

Directed by Mackenzie Donaldson

Culture Representation: Taking place in an unnamed city in the United States, the dramatic film “All the Lost Ones” features a predominantly white cast of characters (with some black people) representing the working-class and middle-class.

Culture Clash: A group of left-wing, racially diverse environmentalists fight for survival during an apocalypse in which a right-wing, white-supremacist militia group has taken over the northeast part of the nation.

Culture Audience: “All the Lost Ones” will appeal primarily to people who are interested in apocalyptic movies, no matter how ridiculous the stories are.

Jasmine Mathews in “All the Lost Ones” (Photo courtesy of Epic Pictures)

“All the Lost Ones” is the title of this frustrating movie but could also describe the plot points that lose their way. This apocalyptic drama, which takes place during an environmental crisis, is a mess of contradictions, plot holes and hokey acting. “All the Lost Ones” is certainly not the only movie about people on opposite sides of the political spectrum who battle for survival and control during an apocalypse. The problem with “All the Lost Ones” is that the movie sets up this intriguing concept, but then constantly sidelines and undermines it with nonsensical action scenes, corny dialogue and sloppy film editing.

Directed by Mackenzie Donaldson, “All the Lost Ones” was written by Anthony Grant and Cheryl Meyer. The movie seems to have the intention of being a provocative commentary on what can happen when people are dealing with not only a climate-change apocalypse but also a civil war. However, the reasons for the sociopolitical divides are ultimately superficial gimmicks that come and go in the story. Most of “All the Lost Ones” consists of poorly staged chase scenes and a mopey pregnant woman wondering why people who are close to her keep dying.

“All the Lost Ones” takes place in an unspecified 21st century period of time in an unnamed city in United States. The movie was actually filmed in Canada, in the Ontario cities of North Bay and Mattawa. The crisis depicted in “All the Lost Ones” wants to trigger images and memories of how the COVID-19 pandemic spawned political battles over wearing masks and getting vaccines. But so much of the crisis in “All the Lost Ones” gets lost in the shuffle of distracting subplots and baffling erasures of crucial things that would be at the forefront of people’s minds if they’re trying to survive the apocalypse that’s described in the movie.

The beginning of “All the Lost Ones” shows a news montage reporting that thousands of people have died from contaminated tap water. Protestors (most of whom are left-wing liberals) who want the controversial Clean Water Bill to be passed into law have occupied the U.S. Capitol building. A right-wing militia group called the United Conservancy opposes the bill because the United Conservancy says that the Clean Water Bill violates people’s right to choose what type of water they want to drink.

The death toll rises. A caption on screen reads, “Six months later, the United Conservancy has occupied a large portion of the North Eastern Seaboard. Groups of civilians find themselves in hiding, torn between two sides of a civil war.” “All the Lost Ones” gives no explanation for how a fringe militia group was able to invade and take over the northeast part of the nation without the U.S. military still not putting up a fight. That’s not a huge issue for the movie, which doesn’t have flashbacks, but it’s the first indication that the movie’s flimsy plot brings up questions that are never answered.

“All the Lost Ones” focuses on a specific group of eight environmental protestors, who are part of a now-scattered community of “resistors.” During the United Conservancy takeover, these eight fugitives have been hiding away at a well-kept, two-story lake house. The synopsis of the movie describes this hideaway dwelling as a “cabin.” It’s not a cabin. It’s a contemporary lake house that’s large enough for eight people to live.

If these resistors are living in discomfort and extreme fear, or are trying to lay low by not calling attention to themselves, you wouldn’t know it from the first time they’re seen on screen. They are having a house party, where they’re playing music and dancing, as if they don’t have any worries. It’s a very strange way to start the movie, after viewers are told that there’s a civil war that has led to a rogue military invasion, there’s a pandemic from contaminated water, and the death toll is rising.

These are the eight people in this group of resistors:

Nia (played by Jasmine Mathews), the moody chief protagonist who is conflicted about being a fugitive in hiding, finds out during the story that she is pregnant.
Ethan (played by Douglas Smith), Nia’s sensitive boyfriend, is more certain than Nia that he wants to settle down and get married.
Penny (played by Vinessa Antoine), Nia’s practical-minded older sister, is a medical doctor who used to work as a radiologist before the apocalypse happened.
Mikael Allen (played by Steven Ogg) wants to be the “alpha male” of the group to make leadership decisions.
Raymond Allen (played by “All the Lost Ones” co-writer Grant), nicknamed Ray, is Mikael’s easygoing cousin.
Nancy Allen (played by Kim Roberts) is Raymond’s nurturing mother and Mikael’s aunt.
Dawn (played by Sheila McCarthy) has a calm personality and is good at planning.
Jacob (played by Matthew Finlan) is Dawn’s outgoing 18-year-old son.

“All the Lost Ones” has such underdeveloped characters, the movie never reveals what anyone in this group (except for Penny) did for a living before the apocalypse. This background information wouldn’t have to be told in flashbacks. It could just be briefly mentioned and would go a long way in explaining who in this group has any particular skills or job experience that could be helpful to their survival.

During the house party, everyone seems to be having a great time. Mikael even gives a drinking toast to say that the party is to celebrate their “six-month anniversary.” But viewers might be wondering, “What’s there to celebrate about going into hiding from an extremist militia group?”

Not everyone at the party remains in a festive mood. Nia goes into the bathroom to vomit. And when a woman of child-bearing age vomits in a movie, it’s usually because she’s intoxicated or pregnant. Nia is not intoxicated. Penny notices that Nia isn’t feeling well, but Nia denies that she’s having any health issues.

During this party, observant viewers will notice that all of the partygoers are drinking out of open plastic cups. Each cup is taped with a piece of paper that has the name of the person who’s holding the cup. What is the purpose of having their plastic cups labeled? Don’t expect the movie to answer that question.

This environmental crisis is about contaminated tap water, not keeping track of who is using what cup, as if they’re afraid of being drugged. Labeling the cups with individual names is also a pointless tactic because an open plastic cup isn’t exactly secure if it’s set down somewhere and could easily be contaminated if someone wanted to contaminate what’s in the cup. It’s yet another example of the movie’s disconnect from logic.

And this is where the logic continues to fall off the rails: For unexplained reasons, during this party, Nia decides now would be a good time to strip down to her underwear and swim in the lake. If you’re in the middle of a pandemic where people are dying from contaminated tap water, the last thing you should want to do is jump in water that is the source of tap water, such as lakes, rivers or reservoirs.

But time and time again, there are scenes in “All the Lost Ones” where people jump in unfiltered and unsanitary bodies of water, with no mention or concern about the water contamination crisis. And keep in mind, these are the same “resistors” who believe that the Clean Water Bill should’ve been passed into law. You’d never know it from the hypocritical and counterproductive ways in which they are acting.

Nia’s impromptu swim is interrupted by the horror of seeing a dead young man in the lake. The movie doesn’t give a clear look at the man, but he looks like he has a bullet hole in the middle of his head. Nia is understandably frightened as she rushes out of the lake. Other people at the party see the floating corpse too.

“Did you see his eyes?” an alarmed Nia asks Penny. It turns out that this dead man’s eyes have been removed. Don’t expect an explanation for that either. The dead man is never seen or mentioned again. This is the movie’s clumsy way of showing that in this apocalyptic world, you could get murdered by gun violence and could end up a corpse floating in a lake without anyone caring to find out who you are because they’re too busy celebrating that they’ve spent six months successfully hiding from the extremist militia group that has taken over the region.

All of this means that it’s only a matter of time before “All the Lost Ones” devolves into a series of chase scenes with shootouts. The resistors are armed with mostly rifles and shotguns, but there is no mention of how they are able to refill the supply of ammunition that they use. There are some almost-laughable scenes where some of the resistors waste their ammunition on lousy-aim gun shots.

Before the shootouts and chase scenes happen, “All the Lost Ones” has some awkward and poorly written scenes that show a few of the romantic entanglements in this group of resistors. During the party, there’s a weirdly toned scene of Jacob and Penny flirting with each other and being touchy-feely, as if they’re sexually attracted to each other. Penny is old enough to be the mother of barely legal Jacob, so this scene looks out-of-place and a little creepy.

Why is Penny acting like she wants teenage Jacob to be her next boyfriend? Don’t expect the movie to answer that question either. There is no personal background or context for the main characters’ personal relationships, although the movie eventually shows who and where Jacob’s father is.

Meanwhile, “All the Lost Ones” has some dull scenes of Nia being pouty with Ethan because she openly expresses doubts about her decision to join Ethan in hiding. Nia tells anyone who listens that she feels guilty and helpless for hiding out when she believes she has an obligation to be fighting in the civil war that’s currently raging. Based on Nia’s inept fighting skills and bad decisions in protecting people around her, she’s better off staying in hiding.

To be clear: “All the Lost Ones” isn’t a real war movie that has massive bombings, air combat or extensive military operations. “All the Lost Ones” is a movie that looks like it’s about a bunch of progressive liberals fighting to survive in a wooded lake area while they are being hunted by a rampaging, ragtag group of white supremacist militia people. In case it isn’t clear that United Conservancy members are white supremacist racists, there’s a Nazi flag proudly displayed in one of the member’s homes.

The United Conservancy members who hunt down the resistors are led by a snarling redneck type named Conrad (played by Devon Sawa), who looks like he stepped out of a doomsday prepper recruitment video. Also part of the United Conservancy are “angry dad” Hank (played Lochlyn Munro) and his teenage son Wyatt (played by Alexander Elliot), who has better aim in his gun shooting than almost all of the adults. And lest you think that United Conservancy only has male fighters, there’s a teenage girl named Ripley (played by Stefani Kimber), who’s part of the group, although she is literally a token female.

During this pandemic where thousands of people are dying from contaminated tap water, “All the Lost Ones” doesn’t show anyone actually dying from contaminated tap water. A clever movie with this subject matter would have shown how bottled and filtered water has become a precious resource that is highly sought-after and exploited for profits. But you get none of that in “All the Lost Ones,” which spends the entire movie acting like contaminated water isn’t a life-or-death danger, even though the contaminated water was the catalyst for this apocalyptic pandemic and this civil war.

Before the violent mayhem starts, there’s a scene where Nia, Dawn and Raymond walk to an abandoned part of the city to look for food and supplies. They go inside a general store, where Nia finds a pregnancy kit. Nia takes a pregnancy test to confirm what she suspected: She’s pregnant.

Nia later tells Ethan, who seems more thrilled about the pregnancy than Nia is because Nia seems to want to be some kind of heroic social justice warrior fighting for The Cause, and motherhood might derail those plans. By the way, Mathews and Smith aren’t very believable as a couple in love. And so, the movie fails at the one romance featured in the story.

There are some rats scurrying around this abandoned store. Raymond hands a mouse trap to Nia and tells her to set the trap because they need rats for their group’s next meal. Wait a minute: These are the same people who just a day or two before were partying like they didn’t have any big worries. And now they’re supposed to be so starved for food, they have to resort to eating rats. The contradictions in this movie start to become very annoying.

The acting performances in “All the Lost Ones” become grating and are made worse by some of the insipid dialogue. There’s a scene where Nia and Penny are in the lake (there they go again, being in possibly contaminated water), as they’re trying to hide from United Conservancy gunmen. Penny has been wounded by a gunshot and questions Nia for putting her pregnancy in jeopardy by trying to hold Penny afloat in the lake. Nia quips, “My body, my choice.” Apparently, we’re supposed to believe that when you’re about to be hunted by raging militia extremists, it helps to quote slogans that you see at pro-choice rallies.

Possibly the only thing that “All the Lost Ones” gets right is composer Trevor Yuile’s music score, which is very effective at creating tension in the scenes that need it. Some of the movie’s cinematography is good, but not consistently so. Ulimately, with a weak and contradictory story, mediocre-to-bad acting, and terrible action scenes, “All the Lost Ones” is an apocalyptic movie that sinks faster than a rock in the movie’s lake.

Epic Pictures released “All the Lost Ones” in select U.S. cinemas on April 18, 2025. The movie was released on digital and VOD on April 22, 2025.

Review: ‘Seven Veils,’ starring Amanda Seyfried, Rebecca Liddiard, Vinessa Antoine, Mark O’Brien and Douglas Smith

May 6, 2025

by Carla Hay

“Seven Veils”

Directed by Atom Egoyan

Culture Representation: Taking place in Toronto, the dramatic film “Seven Veils” features a predominantly white group of people (with a few black people and Latin people) representing the working-class, middle-class and wealthy.

Culture Clash: A theater director is invited to direct the “Salome” opera version of that was created by her deceased mentor, and her work on the opera triggers unpleasant memories from her past.

Culture Audience: “Seven Veils” will appeal primarily to people who are fans of star Amanda Seyfried, filmmaker Atom Egoyan, and opaque dramas that have layers of symbolism and meanings.

Rebecca Liddiard and Michael Kupfer-Radecky in “Seven Veils” (Photo courtesy of XYZ Films)

Not all of the elements work in how “Seven Veils” draws parallels between an avant-garde production of the opera “Salome” and a theater director’s reckoning with her own troubled past. Amanda Seyfried’s gripping performance lifts the film above mediocrity. “Seven Veils” is multilayered film that some viewers might think is too overstuffed with subplots and ideas that don’t always have satisfying answers or resolutions

Written and directed by Atom Egoyan, “Seven Veils” was largely inspired by Egoyan’s own experiences of directing “Salome” for the Canadian Opera Company. The movie had its world premiere at the 2023 Toronto International Film Festival and also screened at the 2024 Berlin International Film Festival. You don’t have to like opera to enjoy “Seven Veils” because the actual performance of “Salome” in the movie is secondary to the drama that happens off stage.

The opera “Salome” is based on the Judeo-Christian story of Salome, a Jewish princess who was the daughter of Herod II and princess Herodias. Herod the Great was her grandfather. Herod Antipas was her stepdaughter. Salome wanted John the Baptist (a disciple of Jesus Christ) to be her lover, but he rejected her. Salome than persuaded Herod Antipas to have John the Baptist beheaded so she could kiss John without him being able to stop it. In the lead-up to this morbid act of lust, Salome also did a seductive dance called the Dance of the Seven Veils.

“Seven Veils” begins by showing theater Jeanine (played by Seyfried) walking through the opera house in Toronto where she will soon be leading a remounting of “Salome,” as a tribute to her mentor who died one year ago. The opera house is bustling with the activity sets being built and people getting ready for rehearsals.

Jeanine walks around as if she’s in a dream. She also sees a large video projection on the wall that shows a girl (played by Elizabeth Reeve) walking through the woods. It’s later revealed that this projection screen is a manifestation of Jeanine’s memories, and the girl is Jeanine in her childhood. Throughout the movie, other scenes of the girl in the woods play out in Jeanine’s mind.

When Jeanine was in her 20s, her mentor/teacher was a theater director named Charles. His widow Beatrice (played by Lanette Ware) knew that Jeanine was one of Charles’ favorite students, so Beatrice personally invited Jeanine to remount the version of “Salome” that Charles had when Jeanine was his protégée/student.

Beatrice formally announces Jeanine as the theater director of this production at a press event. The stars of this version of “Salome” are also introduced. Ambur Dion (played by Ambur Braid) has the role of Salome. Johan Mueller (played by Michael Kupfer-Radecky) has the role of John the Baptist. (Braid and Kupfer-Radecky had these “Salome” roles in real life.)

Other people who are involved in the production are ambitious Rachel (played by Vinessa Antoine), who has the understudy Salome role; eager-to-please Luke (played by Douglas Smith), who has the understudy role of John the Baptist; brittle Nancy (played by Tara Nicodemo), who is the show’s managing producer; and artistic Clea (played by Rebecca Liddiard), the makeup artist who has been assigned to document her “Salome” work on social media. One of Clea’s biggest makeup responsibilities for the production is to design the prosthetic of John the Baptist’s severed head.

Jeanine and Nancy have conflicts because Jeanine wants to make some “minor” changes to the production, but Nancy doesn’t want any changes at all because Nancy says that Beatrice expects Jeanine to keep Charles’ version intact. Clea and Rachel are lovers and are secretly hoping that there will be a reason for Ambur to drop out of the production so Rachel can take over the Salome role. And there’s a sexual harassment incident in this workplace that is reported to management and could derail the entire production.

Meanwhile, Jeanine has to spend a lot of time away from her home because of this job. She communicates by videoconference calls with her restless husband Paul (played by Mark O’Brien) and their daughter Lizzie (played by Maya Misaljevic), who’s about 11 or 12. The family has a nanny named Dimitra (played by Maia Jae Bastidas) as well as Jeanine’s widowed mother Margot (played by Lynne Griffin) to help take are of Lizzie. Margot tells Jeanine that she thinks Paul is having an affair with Dimitra. What Jeanine doesn’t tell Margot is that Jeanine and Paul have decided to try having an open marriage.

All of this sounds like it could be a soap opera, but “Seven Veils” is more complex than that. Jeanine has a dark and disturbing secret that comes back to haunt her the more that she gets involved in the “Salome” production. Her feelings about making changes to the production get more intense as time goes along. And her feelings about power and control of the production become intertwined with how she feels about power and control of her personal life. Although the principal cast members play their roles well, Seyfried is the obvious standout because the Jeanine is the heart and soul of the movie.

“Seven Veils” has cinematography that can be very dreamy and atmospheric but also stark and alarming. It’s a creative way of showing how fuzzy memories and harsh realities sometimes co-exist and collide. Jeanine’s secret is revealed about halfway through the movie, so the rest of “Seven Veils” shows how she copes when she’s forced to think about things that she would rather forget. “Seven Veils” is not always an easy film to watch (and some of it is downright dull and pretentious), but it has a compelling uniqueness that is appealing enough for anyone who is curious about how the story is going to end.

XYZ Films released “Seven Veils” in U.S. cinemas on March 7, 2025.

Review: ‘Don’t Worry Darling,’ starring Florence Pugh, Harry Styles, Olivia Wilde, Gemma Chan, KiKi Layne, Nick Kroll and Chris Pine

September 23, 2022

by Carla Hay

“Don’t Worry Darling”

Directed by Olivia Wilde

Culture Representation: Taking place in a fictional California community named Victory, the sci-fi/drama film “Don’t Worry Darling” features a predominantly white cast of characters (with a few African Americans and Asians) representing the working-class, middle-class and wealthy.

Culture Clash: A homemaker wife with a seemingly perfect life finds her life unraveling when she witnesses things that are too disturbing to ignore, but other people try to convince her that she’s paranoid and mentally ill.

Culture Audience: “Don’t Worry Darling” will appeal mainly to people who are fans of stars Florence Pugh and Harry Styles, but this disappointing dud of a movie serves up an over-used concept that becomes tedious and repetitive with a bungled ending.

Pictured in front, from left to right: Olivia Wilde, Nick Kroll and Chris Pine in “Don’t Worry Darling” (Photo courtesy of Warner Bros. Pictures)

Take a little bit of “The Stepford Wives,” add a lot of “The Twilight Zone,” and remove any real ingenuity. What’s left is a mishandled mush called “Don’t Worry Darling.” The central mystery of the story is too easy to solve, because a similar concept has been used in much better movies. Even without that problem and even with Florence Pugh’s talent, “Don’t Worry Darling” comes undone by a sloppily constructed conclusion.

Directed by Olivia Wilde and written by Katie Silberman, “Don’t Worry Darling” is one of those movies where the off-screen drama is more interesting than the movie itself. This review won’t rehash all the tabloid stories (including all the brouhaha at the movie’s world premiere at the 2022 Venice International Film Festival), but what most people will remember about “Don’t Worry Darling” is that it’s the movie that led to Wilde and co-star Harry Styles becoming romantically involved in real life. “Don’t Worry Darling” isn’t a complete train wreck, but it spins its wheels too many times to the point of monotony, and everything goes completely off the rails in the movie’s last 15 minutes.

We’ve seen this scenario many times before: A movie starts out with a picture-perfect couple who seems to have a picture-perfect life. They seem to be passionately in love. They live in a well-kept house with a perfectly manicured lawn, and the neighboring houses have an eerily similar aesthetic. And all the neighbors lead seemingly idyllic lives too. But, of course, it’s later revealed that the community is far from perfect and is actually quite hellish.

In “Don’t Worry Darling,” the central “perfect” couple are spouses Alice Chambers (played by Pugh) and Jack Chambers (played by Styles), who live in a planned California community named Victory, which is filled with palm trees and is near a desert. (“Don’t Worry Darling” was actually filmed in Palm Springs, California.) Based on the fashion, hairstyles and cars, Alice and Jack seem to be living in the 1950s. Alice is a homemaker, while Jack (and the other men in the community) all work for the Victory Project, a mysterious technological business venture led by a charismatically creepy CEO named Frank (played by Chris Pine). Jack’s job title is technical engineer.

Alice and Jack, who are both in their 20s, have no children. Jack and Alice tell people that they haven’t started a family yet because they want to enjoy life for a while in a child-free marriage. The movie’s opening scene shows Alice and Jack having a house party, where everyone is drunk or tipsy. Alice and some of the other people are playing a game to see who can balance a tray and drinking glass the longest on the top of their heads.

Two of the party guests are a married couple in their late 30s named Bunny (played by Wilde) and Dean (played by Nick Kroll), who like to think of themselves as the “alpha couple” of the Victory community because they’re older than everyone else. Dean is especially eager to be perceived as Frank’s favorite employee at Victory. Bunny (who is sassy and sarcastic) and Dean (who is high-strung and neurotic) have a son and a daughter who are about 5 to 7 years old. Bunny half-jokingly tells Alice that the kids like Alice more than they like Bunny.

Another couple in the Victory community are spouses Peg (played by Kate Berlant) and Peter (played by Asif Ali), who are little quirky but ultimately underwritten and underdeveloped. If Peg and Peter weren’t in the movie, it would have no real impact on the plot at all. Also underdeveloped is a scowling scientist character named Dr. Collins (played by Timothy Simons), who shows up later in the movie and is described as one of the founders of the Victory community.

Frank’s wife is an emotionally aloof diva named Shelley (played by Gemma Chan), who leads the Victory women in group ballet classes. All of the women seem to be a little bit afraid of Shelley. She gives the impression that she can be ruthless if anyone betrays her or the Victory Project.

One day, at one of the ballet classes, Shelley tells the assembled women that a new couple is moving into the neighborhood because the husband will be starting a new job at Victory. The spouses’ names are Bill Johnson (played by Douglas Smith) and Violet Johnson (played by Sydney Chandler), who are both anxious to fit in with this tight-knit Victory community. Bill is a little bit wimpy and socially awkward, while Violet is very demure and introverted.

To welcome Bill and Violet to the Victory community, Frank assembles the community members outdoors on the streets and gives a rousing speech. Bill and Violet look a little overwhelmed. Dean tries to assert himself by chastising Bill for not thinking of Frank with enough reverence. Later, Alice privately tells Bunny that Violet reminds Alice of a “beautiful, terrified baby deer.”

When talking to Bunny, Alice notices a neighbor named Margaret (played by KiKi Layne) standing outside on the front lawn of the house that Margaret shares with her husband Ted (played by Ari’el Stachel). Margaret, whose eyes are closed, seems to be in a daze as she clutches a red toy plane in her hand. It’s enough to say that Alice sees some other disturbing things pertaining to Margaret, including an apparent suicide attempt where Margaret is up on her house roof and looks like she’s ready to jump. (The trailer for “Don’t Worry Darling” already revealed this plot development.)

At the outdoor gathering, Margaret asks people, “Why are we here?” Ted doesn’t like the way that Margaret is asking is question, so he tells Margaret to keep quiet and whisks her away into their house. Margaret is rarely seen out of the house after that, while Alice sees indications that Ted is keeping tight control over Margaret and trying to prevent Margaret from interacting with other people.

Margaret has also been speaking out against Frank and questioning his intentions. It isn’t long before gossip spreads in the neighborhood that Margaret is a mentally ill troublemaker who must be shunned. If this Victory community sounds like a cult, a party scene at Frank’s mansion removes all doubt.

This party scene (like most of the movie’s plot) is already partially revealed in the “Don’t Worry Darling” trailer. At this party, Frank asks Dean in front of the assembled Victory people: “Dean, what’s the enemy of progress?” Dean dutifully replies, “Chaos.” Frank then says, “I see greatness in every single one of you. What are we here for?” The crowd chants, “We’re changing the world!”

Victory has a trolley that is the main form of public transportation in the community. One day, Alice is the only passenger in the trolley when she sees in the distance that a red plane has crashed into a cliff area near the desert. When Alice asks the trolley driver (played by Steve Berg) if he saw the plane crash, he says he didn’t see anything.

Alice begs the trolley driver to go to the plane crash site to get help, but the driver is too afraid and says that it’s a restricted area. Alice decides to walk to the area by herself. What happens after that sets her on a path where she and other people start to question her sanity.

Unfortunately, the trailer for “Don’t Worry Darling” already gives away the fact that this movie has men in red jumpsuits chasing after people, so it’s easy to figure out that these men are sent to oppress people who “disobey” the Victory rules. Guess who becomes one of those targets? It’s all so predictable.

Pugh does a skillful job of portraying Alice’s psychological torment, but ultimately, Alice (like all of the characters in this movie) are very hollow. Styles is adequate as Alice’s increasingly estranged husband Jack, who is torn between his loyalty to Alice and his loyalty to Victory. But after a while, the obvious and over-used plot development of “the woman who is not believed and labeled as mentally ill” gets run into the ground early and often in “Don’t Worry Darling,” At a certain point in the movie, you just know the men in the red jumpsuits will be part of a big chase scene, because it’s already revealed in the movie’s trailer.

“Don’t Worry Darling” tries to have some visual flair, with repetitive images of the people of Victory moving in sync with each other, as if they’re pre-programmed robots. This visual styling is shown in the scenes with the ballet classes, as well as the Victory community’s morning ritual of the wives going on their front lawns to wave goodbye to their husbands, who drive off to go to work in perfect sync in their flashy cars. The movie also repeats images (many of them psychedelic) of things in the shape of a circle, whether they are close-ups of eye pupils or women dancing like they’re in a Busby Berkeley musical.

All of this eye-catching cinematography comes off as shallow and a bit pretentious after a while, because the story falls so flat toward the end. “Don’t Worry Darling” hastily throws in some heavy-handed feminist messages but doesn’t have anything clever or new to say that 1975’s “The Stepford Wives” didn’t already cover decades ago. The half-baked ending of “Don’t Worry Darling” just brings up questions that are never answered.

Wilde and Silberman previously collaborated on the 2019 teen comedy “Booksmart,” which was Wilde’s feature-film directorial debut. And although the critically acclaimed “Booksmart” uses a lot of familiar teen comedy plot devices, “Booksmart” has dialogue, acting and character development that are appealing. The same can’t be said for “Don’t Worry Darling,” which has talented cast members, who look all dressed up but have nowhere artistically to go in this boring sci-fi tripe posing as an intriguing psychological thriller.

Warner Bros Pictures released “Don’t Worry Darling” in U.S. cinemas on September 23, 2022.