By Robert Scucci | Being published
Want to spend your evening beads worried beyond belief? If you’re a submissive for pain, punishment, and the most unpleasant escalation you’ve ever seen on film, 2012 Compliance It checks all the boxes to make sure you’ll finish your day standing quietly in the shower while the hot water puts the outer bags of skin on your body in ways I consider to be the ones I see the most.
Based on real events that you wish didn’t exist, Compliance It exists because we still have a long way to go to curb our willingness to blindly obey authority figures. It’s not an easy watch, but it’s the best kind of crash course in what makes you so much fun that it sticks with you for days.
The most frustrating of all is how easily things blow up when someone thinks their belongings are at risk after receiving a series of clear threats over the phone. Disturbing interference with energy in the heat of the moment, Compliance It will make you sick to your stomach with its cautionary tale about taking everything you hear at face value without questioning your analyst’s motives.
Setup, and phone
Compliance It’s set in 2012 Ohio, but it draws on part of the strip search scams that originated in 2004 Kentucky. We are introduced to Sandra Frum (Ann Dowd), the manager of chickwich, a fast food joint operated mostly by high school and college kids who work for minimum wages.
Sandra is high but seemed well-intentioned, dealing with the usual headaches that come with eating fast food. His Friday starts off on the wrong foot when he hears a cool halk-in delivery on opening night, pulling in $1,500 of the list.
Already on the brink of a last minute delivery that you won’t get through the weekend, Sandra learns that Corporate has sent secret buyers to her location to check out the quality control area, so everyone has to be on their game. Things take a turn for the worse when she receives a call from someone who identifies herself as Officer Daniels (Pat Healy), who accuses one of his salespeople, Becky (Dreaka Walker), of stealing from a client.
The worst kind of climbing
Frazzed by the Friday Night Rush, Sandra quickly complied with the lawsuit signed by Daniels, who pressured her into looking for stycy to look for the missing money. First, Becky’s clothes and purse are taken, but that’s not enough for Daniels, who has urgent words and an authorized delivery to send Sandra to continue the search. Focusing more on keeping the restaurant running and impressing the other employees, Sandra puts the other employees to stay in line with Daniels, who forces each participant to go deeper in his so-called calling.
Luckily for Becky, several of her co-workers knew right away that something was wrong, but the problem was. They try to do what Sandra says because he is their boss and their jobs are on the line, and Sandra follows orders that Cecky is not only a thief, but a person of interest in a very serious case involving her brother.
Compliance It continues to throw the field badly as Daniel raises the stakes, forcing Cecky into increasingly aggressive situations at the hands of his employer. Running a restaurant with complete fear, Sandra has never been a question caller and does everything he orders, waiting for the officials to arrive and close the investigation.
No job is worth this level of pressure
As the girl’s father, Compliance It was a difficult watch because you would never want to see your daughter being attacked by deception of this magnitude, especially at work. You want your child to be safe while learning how to be a responsible adult as he works part-time to understand the real world before he fully integrates.
Also, you want whoever your child is working with to have their back. The film is a brutal commentary on how easily we appeal to authority without doing even the smallest amount of due diligence, but it hits hard because events like this happen without having seen enough life to be able to see that there is something deep about this situation. Sandra, on the other hand, should every step of the way know better.
A Masterclass in what not to do when threatened by an unseen, imagined, Compliance It gets under your skin but it’s worth the watch because it’s an absolute delight. But that doesn’t mean it won’t make you lose your faith in humanity.
Compliance free streaming on tubi.
