Compliance is the disturbing story of a serial phone-prankster in the U.S, who called a fast-food restaurant pretending to be a police officer in order to get the employees to conduct a series of degrading tasks. The orders that these employees are willing to follow and be subjected to are shocking, and you might find them hard to believe, but before Compliance begins, we are informed that it is based on a true story, and that ‘the events have been in no way exaggerated’. Although we may roll our eyes at such a statement, it appears that this film really does remain very faithful to the series of actual events. These events can supposedly be explained scientifically by an experiment conducted in the ‘60s by Yale University psychologist Stanley Milgram, where he found that participants were willing to perform acts that went against their conscience because they were instructed by an authority figure. Director Craig Zobel handles his shocking subject matter excellently, empirically and delicately investigating with the precision of a scientist; and yet this never makes the film feel cold, instead we are given genuine and life-like people, of the kind that we seem to recognise, who are tragically affected by the prank.
The prankster/Officer Daniels (Pat Healy) says that he is with a victim who has reported that money has been stolen from her purse by one of the employees, Becky (Dreama Walker), at the fast-food restaurant, ChickWich, and that the police have surveillance to corroborate the victim’s claim. Before the prankster calls, Zobel perceptively gives us bits of insight into fast-food culture, and the specific employees involved, which establish the foundations for this prank to work. Overnight a freezer has been left open which has ruined 1,500dollars worth of bacon stock, and this has made manager Sandra (Ann Dowd – recently seen in Side Effects) fearful of consequences from the corporate hierarchy. Compliance clearly understands the culture of fast-food restaurants and their employees, and it is from this knowledge that the hoax becomes plausible. Managers of fast-food restaurants, like Sandra, occupy isolated positions; on one side, they are seen as tyrants by their stereotypically teenage and irresponsible employees, while on the other their job is their livelihood and so they are forced to take responsibility for the restaurant and work hard to impress the corporate managers. It is of credit to Compliance – and all the more disturbing for it – that the prankster also seems human, he has a sense of humour (albeit twisted), and he is intelligent. He is aware of the fast-food culture, and so when he speaks to Sandra he tells her that he has her area manager on the other line, and so when he gives her orders he speaks not only with the authority of a police officer but also with that of the area manager, and when he complements her on doing a good job strip-searching Becky she thinks that she is also impressing her area manager. Indeed, as the prankster knows, the world of fast-food and its employees seems ripe for this kind of hoax to succeed.
Compliance avoids writing off ChickWich’s workers as merely stupid, instead they are people of a unique culture, their insecurities specific, and their anxieties exploited precisely by the prankster. It is clear, in Compliance, that the employees have free-will, some of them not so easily manipulated and some less willing, hence one of the employees, Kevin (Philip Ettinger), resists because he is of a similar age to Becky, and thus empathises with her. It is from this that Compliance derives its humanity, the characters interact, and make choices – most bad, some good – based on their relationships. Indeed, Compliance is not one of Milgram’s experiments, which can be conducted over and over again with controlled variables to get the same results. Rather, in Compliance the variables are very specific, some are the features of the fast-food culture that have been extensively studied by the prankster to be exploited, and others arise by pure chance. Sandra’s partner, Van (Bill Camp), is drunk when he is called upon to help, and his inebriated state makes him more receptive to the orders of the prankster, but also, more vulnerable to the pressures put on him by Sandra. This significant variable, therefore, leads to Kevin and Van making understandably, but nevertheless worryingly, different moral choices, and which produces different results in the prankster’s hoax.
Compliance is the story of only one of the prankster’s seventy similar hoaxes, and it may be the most extreme – the time where he struck the jackpot scenario with the right people – but it is disturbing in revealing the potential for human manipulation. When the prank is over, sometime later, Sandra is asked whether she still sees her partner Van, but to judge him is to judge herself. Perhaps Sandra is no less responsible than Van for the monstrosity that took place, but then what about Kevin, who resisted but barely took steps to prevent it? And what is the victim’s role, should she be persecuted for so easily complying? Likewise, we may think that we wouldn’t fall for a similar hoax, but perhaps if our deepest insecurities are so unscrupulously exploited, do we really know that we wouldn’t comply at all? The answer may be too disturbing for you to even consider.
The prankster/Officer Daniels (Pat Healy) says that he is with a victim who has reported that money has been stolen from her purse by one of the employees, Becky (Dreama Walker), at the fast-food restaurant, ChickWich, and that the police have surveillance to corroborate the victim’s claim. Before the prankster calls, Zobel perceptively gives us bits of insight into fast-food culture, and the specific employees involved, which establish the foundations for this prank to work. Overnight a freezer has been left open which has ruined 1,500dollars worth of bacon stock, and this has made manager Sandra (Ann Dowd – recently seen in Side Effects) fearful of consequences from the corporate hierarchy. Compliance clearly understands the culture of fast-food restaurants and their employees, and it is from this knowledge that the hoax becomes plausible. Managers of fast-food restaurants, like Sandra, occupy isolated positions; on one side, they are seen as tyrants by their stereotypically teenage and irresponsible employees, while on the other their job is their livelihood and so they are forced to take responsibility for the restaurant and work hard to impress the corporate managers. It is of credit to Compliance – and all the more disturbing for it – that the prankster also seems human, he has a sense of humour (albeit twisted), and he is intelligent. He is aware of the fast-food culture, and so when he speaks to Sandra he tells her that he has her area manager on the other line, and so when he gives her orders he speaks not only with the authority of a police officer but also with that of the area manager, and when he complements her on doing a good job strip-searching Becky she thinks that she is also impressing her area manager. Indeed, as the prankster knows, the world of fast-food and its employees seems ripe for this kind of hoax to succeed.
Compliance avoids writing off ChickWich’s workers as merely stupid, instead they are people of a unique culture, their insecurities specific, and their anxieties exploited precisely by the prankster. It is clear, in Compliance, that the employees have free-will, some of them not so easily manipulated and some less willing, hence one of the employees, Kevin (Philip Ettinger), resists because he is of a similar age to Becky, and thus empathises with her. It is from this that Compliance derives its humanity, the characters interact, and make choices – most bad, some good – based on their relationships. Indeed, Compliance is not one of Milgram’s experiments, which can be conducted over and over again with controlled variables to get the same results. Rather, in Compliance the variables are very specific, some are the features of the fast-food culture that have been extensively studied by the prankster to be exploited, and others arise by pure chance. Sandra’s partner, Van (Bill Camp), is drunk when he is called upon to help, and his inebriated state makes him more receptive to the orders of the prankster, but also, more vulnerable to the pressures put on him by Sandra. This significant variable, therefore, leads to Kevin and Van making understandably, but nevertheless worryingly, different moral choices, and which produces different results in the prankster’s hoax.
Compliance is the story of only one of the prankster’s seventy similar hoaxes, and it may be the most extreme – the time where he struck the jackpot scenario with the right people – but it is disturbing in revealing the potential for human manipulation. When the prank is over, sometime later, Sandra is asked whether she still sees her partner Van, but to judge him is to judge herself. Perhaps Sandra is no less responsible than Van for the monstrosity that took place, but then what about Kevin, who resisted but barely took steps to prevent it? And what is the victim’s role, should she be persecuted for so easily complying? Likewise, we may think that we wouldn’t fall for a similar hoax, but perhaps if our deepest insecurities are so unscrupulously exploited, do we really know that we wouldn’t comply at all? The answer may be too disturbing for you to even consider.