Compliance - A review

Every once in a while a movie pops up that has everybody talking for a day or two. And...then it's totally forgotten. Compliance is such a movie. It had great reviews a few years back and nowadays you really have to search to find it. None of my movie-buff friends have seen it. And that's strange because it is a really great movie. True, I'm a big fan of movies that take place in a singular location (like a play) so that's already a plus for me. But the fascinating story and the great acting to support it also caused me to become emotionally involved in the movie.

The story in short: 

The manager of a fast-food establishment gets a call from a so-called police officer who tells her that one of her workers has stolen from a client. If she would be so kind to investigate.

That's basically all you need to know about the story. And I hope common sense has kicked in while you read the above because it isn't common practice for the police to ask other people to do their work for them.

So there's something not-quite-right from the get go and that's where the title: Compliance gets dark. Because the characters either follow the phone-officer's demands (almost) to the letter without hesitation or step back to let somebody else do the dirty work. And each new task gets darker and darker.

Now, me sitting on the sofa (you sitting on the sofa) might wonder during this movie why somebody would do such a thing without second guessing? This simple blind reliance to a voice on a phone.

And, I must admit, near the end the movie does take the leap so far out there that it is hard to suspend disbelief that anyone would actually go on with the requests (though, according to the credits, there have been several cases in the US).

There are several psychological games interwoven in the script like peer pressure and authority figures to make this happen. And we all know that ol' test of the guy in the white coat asking to: "press the button again".

The experiment was as such. An actor was placed in a chair and each time a button was pushed he would howler out in pain as if he was electrocuted (fake of course -he was a good actor). So random people -oblivious to the fact that this was an actor- came in and their guide asked them to push the button. The actor would subsequently cry out in 'pain'. Then those people would be asked to press the button again. Now, if the man asking was wearing a lab coat (= authority figure) chances of people pressing the button again were much higher than if the man asking was wearing a normal suit. This tells you something about the influence simple clothing can have.

There's an old joke based on this story - so here it goes.

Three candidates for the CIA (two men and a woman) are up for the final test of their training. The first man enters the room and his teacher tells him: "Inside the next room is you fiance. Here's a gun, you've got five minutes to kill her!".

The man goes inside and after three minutes he comes out crying that he simply cannot do it.

"Too bad for you." The teacher tells him "You're going home. Wait here and keep you mouth shut!"

Then the second man enters and the teacher gives him a gun and tells him: "Inside the next room is your wife. You've got five minutes to kill her!".

Again, after four minutes the man comes out and confesses that he cannot kill his beloved.

"Too bad for you." The teacher repeats "You're going home. Wait here and keep you mouth shut!"

Then the woman enters. She's handed a gun with the mission to kill her husband. While she's inside the teacher tells the men: "Oh, don't you worry lads, the gun I handed you only fires blanks. Do you really think we would ask something like that from you?"

A minute later the woman comes out, completely out of breath: "Tha-that..." She began. "That gun you gave me only fires blanks, I had to strangle Harvey with my brazier!".

But top that off with three dimensional characters and you've one heck of a psychological thriller going. Not only because you can somehow understand why this character would go this far. But also because you look at yourself and wonder: 'would I do this?'. Which brings me to the sucker punch of the finale. In the end all the characters are still three dimensional -with which I mean to say that- it isn't your standard Hollywood fare wherein the 'villain' recognizes or learn from his or her mistakes. No, they were following orders and apparently that makes you just as much a victim. Just to be clear: No it does not clear you from what you did!

But that's basically the cherry on top of a movie that delves deep into humans (psychological) need to follow orders. Even if it is just a voice on the phone.