You thought Regina George was a menace? Meet Linda Liddle. Rachel McAdams adds to her collection of complex female characters with Sam Raimi’s Send Help.
“Don’t ever mistake my kindness for weakness.”
Rachel McAdams utters this line around halfway through Sam Raimi’s comedic psychological thriller Send Help, and it serves as one of the most important statements in the film.
Sure, the latest flick from the man who gave us The Evil Dead delivers on gore and horror elements his longtime devotees will love, but Send Help also astutely comments on class dynamics and gender politics in the workplace in a more subtle fashion than McAdams spearheading a boar.
For as over-the-top and high-concept as Send Help is, bubbling under the surface is a whip-smart two-hander from screenwriters Mark Swift and Damian Shannon that feels fresh and compelling without ever teetering into “girl boss” territory. (Although during the screening, I couldn’t help but think about statistics about women over 40 experiencing gender discrimination, which this film touches upon without ever calling it out.)
McAdams plays Linda Liddle — not from Accounting! — but from Strategy and Planning, the quirky lady in the office who eats tuna sandwiches at her desk and then subsequently will have a conversation with you with something in her teeth. We’ve seen McAdams play romantic, mean-girl, doting mother, and reporter, but we’ve never seen her in something like this, where she’s playing the loner, weirdo type. (There’s a scene where she’s talking with her bird Sweetie that is Michelle-Pfeiffer-as-Catwoman coded.)
Linda is frumpy but loyal, a pushover and the CEO’s right-hand woman. That is until he dies and his successor — son, Bradley Preston, played by the wonderfully smarmy Dylan O’Brien — takes over and hires his frat bud to take Linda’s promotion. He takes Linda on a work trip so she can train his buddy, and they crash into the ocean, with him and Linda as the lone survivors on a deserted island.
And that’s about all I want to tell you about this film other than there are enough fun twists, laughs, and Survivor references to make this a thrilling theater experience and remind you of why movies are important.
McAdams is completely game and shows us new sides of herself we’ve never seen before. While this probably won’t be an Oscar play for her, Send Help reinforces her strengths and makes you wonder what we haven’t seen from her yet (I think there’s an Oscar-winning performance in her). O’Brien is a worthy adversary, both funny and charming, and his chemistry with McAdams simmers with each role reversal.
Send Help is in theaters January 30.
