Much like a horror movie,
Promising Young Woman opens with a kill scene. (Or does it? The film remains coy on this point for a moment.) A clique of men in business suits gather around a loud, pulsating bar, bitching about how they can’t even go to strip clubs on the company dime anymore. The camera pans over to Cassandra draped over a red vinyl booth in Christlike repose, so wasted she doesn’t seem to notice that her skirt has risen up far enough to expose her underwear. Jerry (Brody), the gentleman of the group, offers to take her home, only to “change his mind” and bring her back to his apartment mid-ride share. He made his choice, and now he’ll pay for it as Mulligan reveals when her expression changes from sloppy to stone-cold sober like the flip of a switch. She’s not a lost lamb but a hunter on the prowl, and Jerry here is about to learn his lesson about taking advantage of drunk women.