‘Blink Twice’ and the Dangerous Evolution of Cancel Culture [Fatal Femmes]
Editor’s Note: The following contains major spoilers for Blink Twice.
On October 15, 2017, Alyssa Milano tweeted the phrase “Me Too” and encouraged her followers to identify themselves as survivors of sexual harassment and assault. The brainchild of activist Tarana Burke, Milano’s tweet went viral and millions of people began sharing their stories. It was a watershed moment in our cultural history, coinciding with the takedown of sexual predator Harvey Weinstein and a wave of high-profile men losing coveted positions due to allegations of sexual misconduct. A centuries-old power imbalance suddenly seemed on the verge of destruction.
But the patriarchy has deep roots and a strong foundation of men and women dedicated to its survival. Seven years later, crisis PR reps now specialize in guiding celebrities through similar fallout and the term “cancel culture” has become a tool more frequently used to defend abhorrent behavior than to decry it. We’re told we’re living in a “post-#MeToo” world and expected to make do with formulaic apologies and hollow attempts at atonement. Enter Zoë Kravitz’s Blink Twice. By exploring the aftermath of cancellation, Kravitz asks how we move forward when one-half of the conversation refuses to operate in good faith.
Her Story
Blink Twice follows, Frida (Naomi Ackie), a struggling waiter and nail tech who trips and falls at the feet of dreamy tech billionaire Slater King (Channing Tatum). After this textbook meet-cute, she and her roommate Jess (Alia Shawkat) join Slater’s extravagant party and drink with his friends until the early morning. On a whim, he invites them both to the private island he bought in the wake of a public scandal. At first, this tropical paradise seems too good to be true. Slater is a generous host, providing luxurious private quarters, gourmet food, and an expensive, white wardrobe to account for the fact that they have no luggage. While the vibe is flirtatious, Slater and his male friends are respectful and seem to enjoy getting to know their beautiful young guests. Frida and Jess adorn themselves with the island’s unique flower-based perfume and while away the afternoons poolside at the picturesque retreat.
But the days bleed together and Jess begins to feel uneasy. After suffering a snake bite, she insists there’s something wrong with the extravagant island. Frida downplays her concerns and convinces her to stay. The next morning, Jess is gone. Her room is filled with dusty, discarded furniture and the only trace of her existence is a signature lighter. Even more disturbing, Frida barely remembers Jess’s presence on the island. If not for a sip of snake venom, the confused young woman would believe she boarded the plane alone.
This green concoction turns out to be the antidote for a memory-erasing chemical disguised as the island’s exclusive perfume. Drinking more causes horrific memories to flood back in and Frida realizes that she and the other women have suffered ongoing and extreme sexual assault. After dinner each night, the men bind and rape them, then use the perfume to make them forget. They wake up each morning with no memory of the attack and fall into the horrific cycle all over again.
Her Victims
We first meet Slater in an interview detailing his return to public life. After a vague “abuse of power” scandal several years ago, Slater stepped down as CEO of his powerful tech company and bought a private island where he raises chickens, goes to therapy, and generally tries to better himself. During long walks on the pristine grounds, he discusses his treatment with Frida and she extols the virtues of forgetting emotional pain. While her logic may be sound, the story’s twist paints a darker picture. After the film’s bloody climax, Slater offers Frida a chance to forget again. He can erase all traumatic memories he’s caused and they can go back to laughing over brunch.
It’s in this plea to wipe the slate clean that Slater reveals his true motivation. In the face of disturbing accusations, Slater did all the right things. He issued an apology and gave up his power. but none of it mattered. He will never enjoy the total forgiveness he craves. Public shaming has convinced Slater that true forgiveness doesn’t exist. The only thing that matters is forgetting. While frustrating to hear, his point is valid and unearths a dangerous side effect of cancel culture.
Once someone has been “canceled”, they don’t cease to exist. They may step back from public life, but they don’t go away. Time and again we’ve seen a canceled man become radicalized by the only communities willing to tolerate him. Rather than learn and grow, they become resentful and find more insidious ways to continue their misdeeds. With no models for true redemption, we’ve created an all-or-nothing approach to reform that tells canceled men there’s no way back so what’s the point in trying?
Of course, the infuriating piece of this complex puzzle is that Slater does not seem very contrite. He’s learned an entire dictionary’s worth of therapy speak and uses self-effacing language to disarm his victims while distracting them from his true intentions. He’s done the surface work he’s been told to do, but changed nothing about his core beliefs. This well-worn blueprint seems to be working and Slater is inching his way back into collective good graces. But that’s not enough for the egotistical billionaire. He doesn’t want to continue a lifelong path to forgiveness, he wants a clean slate. And knowing he will never get it has turned him into an even bigger monster.
Like many practiced abusers, Slater has built a close-knit circle of friends who encourage and benefit from his bad behavior. Clearly a parallel to Jeffrey Epstein and his long list of contacts, “Pussy Island” is filled with men jumping at the chance to engage in consequence-free rape. Following Slater’s lead, they enjoy relaxing days and pleasant conversation then commit atrocious acts of sexual assault after the sun goes down. Adding insult to injury, they constantly ask their female guests if they’re having a good time. On the surface, this reads as a need to massage Slater’s ego and continually thank him for his generosity, but the full story reveals a darker intent. The men are essentially rubbing the women’s noses in their own assault and creating a permission structure for continued abuse.
Only one of Slater’s male guests seems to have reservations about the island’s true purpose. Slater’s young protege, Lucas (Levon Hawke) is new to the group and likely enjoying his first trip to this nefarious paradise. After the women’s vicious revenge, he finds himself dosed with the drug and struggles to remember what he’s done. Slater assuages his fears by telling him that he’s done nothing—before detailing the problem with this inaction. Lucas has done nothing to overtly harm, but he has also done nothing to help. He’s been watching these heinous crimes unfold before him and consciously allowing them to continue. With no intervention, it’s only a matter of time before he begins to join in. Embodying the #NotAllMen excuse, he removes himself from the conflict with the privilege of knowing he will never become a victim.
Kravitz skewers another complicit archetype with Stacy (Geena Davis), Slater’s long-suffering assistant. Perpetually frazzled, she scrambles around coordinating his schedule, juggling parcels, and struggling to find the perfect place for his favorite chair. When her own memories start to return, Frida extends a comforting hand. But Stacy responds with violence, screaming that she does not want to remember. She knows exactly who she works for and what he does. She’s chosen to forget in order to maintain her proximity to power and the illusion of safety. Like so many women, she excuses his horrific behavior simply by choosing to look the other way. With Lucas and Stacy, Kravitz suggests that men like Slater will always exist and perhaps our energy is better served by targeting those who watch from the sidelines. What good is nominal solidarity or allyship if those with power do nothing to effect change?
Her Weapons
Luckily, Frida and fellow vacationer Sarah (Adria Arjona) recover their memories while the men are away on a fishing excursion. Upon their return, they plaster on pleasant expressions while frantically strategizing behind the scenes. They smile and nod, continuing to insist they’re having a good time. This deceit is a common tool used to survive ongoing systems of abuse. When escape seems inevitable and fighting back could lead to death, many choose to submit to an attacker, hoping to simply live through the nightmare. It’s a completely understandable and justified defense mechanism that has probably saved countless lives.
However, this strategic passivity can lead to long-term abdication of power and complicity. We become practiced at compartmentalizing abuse, making it easier to dismiss and forget each new occurrence. Stacy probably once told herself she was waiting for the perfect moment to do the right thing. But somewhere along the way, she crossed a line and became one more cog in Slater’s wheel of depravity.
At the group’s final dinner in Blink Twice, the men goad Sarah into describing how this trip has changed her life. Remembering her time on an exploitative reality show, Sarah states the importance of women working together. We’ve been taught to compete with each other for safety and male approval, but this infighting only perpetuates a patriarchal system. Instead of working against each other, we should be joining forces to lift each other up. As if speaking prophecy, the women do band together and turn on the men. Once their memories return, Frida, Sarah, Heather (Trew Mullen), and Camilla (Liz Caribel) use whatever weapons they can find to get revenge. In contrast to the men’s rapacious evenings, they unleash bloody fury and attack with knives, guns, corkscrews, and furniture as payback for their hellish ordeals.
Her Motive
With his friends dead or wounded, Slater offers Frida a chance to forget. But she slips the potion into his vape pen and one hit causes him to lose his bearings. This one moment of confusion is enough to gain the upper hand and Frida drags him outside while the estate burns down. The next year we see Slater struggling with his memory at the annual gala event. Frida has now become Mrs. Slater King and CEO of his massive empire. She may have allowed him to escape unharmed, but she now wields the power his platform affords.
It’s a shocking conclusion that casts a troubling shadow over our current reality. With this unexpected twist, Kravitz asks us: what should Frida do? Should she expose Slater’s crimes or commandeer his power? Given how the world treats survivors of sexual assault, revealing the truth would require sharing horrific personal details on a worldwide stage, opening the door for revictimization and scorn. As a Black woman accusing a white man, she would probably be vilified and accused of fabricating the rapes or even murdering Slater as part of an elaborate scheme to take over his wealth. Hasn’t she already suffered enough? She’s taken down his horrific island and saved future victims from a similar fate. Were she to make his crimes public, who knows what other men would follow in his footsteps.
Perhaps now she can use his expansive platform to lift women up and his wealth to fund positive change. With Slater completely under her control, she can guide him into creating a model for real atonement and set a precedent for men accused of wrongdoing. Telling the truth may have saved her once, but now she has the opportunity to use patriarchal tools to her advantage and systematically destroy the system from the inside out.
Her Legacy
While this is what I hope Frida will do with her hard-won power, Blink Twice does not confirm or deny it. We simply see a fabulous woman seize control and fill in the details for ourselves. Kravitz is not interested in presenting a blueprint for salvation. Her brutal film is designed to expose fallacies at the heart of our current system and empower women to find strength in each other. The truth is, there is no single story that will end patriarchal oppression and systematic sexual violence. We must do that on our own. #MeToo may have lit the flame, but now we must decide where to go with the torch.
In the ongoing war against habitual victimizers, we can no longer ignore the damaging evolution of cancel culture. Slater believes that after a public downfall, the only way to regain his power is to say the right things and hide his crimes more effectively. He has learned nothing but a more efficient way to abuse and control. And he’s far from the only one. We’re now seeing a playbook for superficial redemption led by predators discovering new ways to manipulate the system. We must have honest conversations about what happens to abusers the day after their cancellation and develop plans for restorative justice while supporting survivors on their own terms. Until we can venture into these complicated waters, the Slater Kings of the world will continue to evolve and our patriarchal world will adapt to protect them.
Categorized:Editorials Fatal Femmes
