Is The Assistant Any Good? Will It Be Worth Your Time?

The Assistant is a docudrama-style feature set in a terrifyingly realistic story of a young female assistant at a film production company. The catch? Its leader is implied to be a serial sexual predator.

The film industry has been notoriously housing predators for a long time, as the #MeToo movement has exposed. As seen in the case of Harvey Weinstein, the systematic abusive practices have been ignored for too long.

Awful bosses are a film staple, especially since The Devil Wears Prada. The Assistant imagines what a day would be like for the assistant of a film executive like Harvey Weinstein, who is a convicted sexual predator.

1. Quick Review

The film’s premise follows a young female graduate who joins a production company. She begins to see a pattern in the suspicious practices and shady behavior used by her employer, a high-powered Hollywood mogul, over the span of a day.

The film debuted at the Telluride Film Festival in August, 2019, where critics singled out powerful performances. It has been much-awaited ever since Harvey Weinstein was found guilty of rape, but acquitted of the most serious charges.

2. Info

3. Is It Worth Watching?

Director Kitty Green’s The Assistant tugs on the growing thread of sexual harassment and predatory nature of powerful moguls in Hollywood. She showcases the way they turn it into an everyday part of an industry to be covered up and ignored.

THE ASSISTANT Trailer (2020) Julia Garner, Drama Movie

By focusing on the events of a single day through a single character’s experience, Green captures the horror of working in such an abusive environment. There is little need for embellishment, and she delivers a straightforward story.

It would have been easy for The Assistant to become a film about the boss. However, Weinstein and predators like him rely on power structures that enable them to remain sexual predators, and this comes through in the film.

The assistant’s actions are neither supported nor condemned. The film focuses on the broader structures in which abuse occurs, rather than on specific predators, to the point where her boss isn’t given a name, or shown to the audience.

What’s also striking about The Assistant is just how subtly Green gets this all across. No one is sexually assaulted on camera, and the little tasks Jane completes add up to a larger, more troubling picture.

I. Plot

Jane (played by Julia Garner) has been working at the office for nearly two months. She arrives at work before sunrise. She tidies up, takes care of the trash, and wipes down the couch in her boss’ office.

When the work day begins, she’s subjected to an endless stream of similarly demeaning tasks. She struggles with the work the two male assistants don’t want to deal with, and suffers streams of verbal abuse from her boss.

She’s always expected to follow everything she does with an apology for drawing his ire. She tolerates everything the job demands, because she thinks keeping the job could be her chance to move ahead in the film industry.

However, her willingness to stay tolerant is tested soon. Sienna (played by Kristine Froseth), a new assistant, happened to catch the boss’ eye. Now he wants to meet her alone in a hotel, even though she doesn’t want to.

Jane, worried by the turn of events, tries to takes action.

II. Music and Visuals

The music director of the film is Tamar-Kali. She is a Brooklyn-born African-American singer-songwriter and film score composer. She is a second-generation musician with roots in the coastal Sea Islands of South Carolina.

Tamar-Ali began composing music for films and television in 2017. Her work on Dee Rees’ Oscar-nominated Mudbound garnered her the World Soundtrack Academy’s 2018 Discovery of the Year Award.

The sound track of this film includes songs such as Washed Away by Emily Jane White, Beautiful Hell by Adna, Appointments by Julien Baker, Wasting My Young Years by London Grammar, and Strange by Runah.

Green makes her narrative feature debut with The Assistant. The almost clinical way in which the events are shot is refreshing. The use of somber, muted colors to set the tone for a brewing storm adds to the film’s subtlety.

4. Grade

5. Final Thoughts

Director Green is best known not for fiction features but for her documentaries, which explore the way that bigger systems impact the lives of ordinary people. They include Casting JonBenét (2017) and Ukraine is Not A Brothel (2013).

Instead of addressing the sexual assault allegations head-on, director Kitty Green turned to fiction to explore the power dynamic of Hollywood, as well as what made Weinstein such a feared figure in the industry.

If Jane does nothing, the cycle of abuse will continue. If she speaks up, she loses her job. There’s no one she can turn to; everyone around accepts that this is just the way things are.

With no place to turn to, how could the film end? Watch it to find out.