Movies
“Sanctuary” Is A Unique Play On Power Dynamics, And Most Definitely NSFW
Sanctuary (2023) is a strange movie, and one you should not watch on a train sitting next to someone.
“Follows a dominatrix and Hal, her wealthy client, and the disaster that ensues when Hal tries to end their relationship.”
Director: Zachary Wigon
Writer: Micah Bloomberg
Stars: Christopher Abbott, Margaret Qualley
Release: May 19, 2023
IMDB
Sanctuary (2023) is a strange movie, and one you should not watch on a train sitting next to someone.
Hal (Christopher Abbott) is a young man who is poised to inherit a mammoth of a hotel franchise following the passing of his father. We meet Hal isolated in a room of his new occupation where he is joined by a dominatrix for hire, Rebecca (Margaret Qualley). A session transpires, and contractual obligations are met, but the epilogue of their meetup devolves into chaos that becomes personal and destructive. Hal and Rebecca wrestle with each other’s egos and secrets to try and gain the upper hand in a series of arguments that span from outwardly sexually superficial to the deeply introspective.
There is little doubt that the first 20 minutes of Sanctuary will have your attention. If you go into this movie knowing absolutely nothing about it, you will be asking yourself what you have gotten into. Rebecca comes in throwing 100 mph asking Hal a series of questions that are deeply personal. The frames of their relationship aren’t defined until the character Rebecca is playing gets Hal to his satisfying self completion…if you catch my drift.
Again, don’t watch this movie on a train next to someone. It will be remarkably uncomfortable.
We meet the characters of Hal and Rebecca as characters who are giving performances as part of a scene. After the scene is played out we meet Hal and Rebecca as characters putting on a different act to show face in “reality” towards the other. They are pretending to be who they want the other person to perceive them as. Hal is the main perpetrator of this, for Rebecca can’t keep that facade once she is told by Hal that he will no longer be requesting her services because someone of his not occupational stature can’t be partaking in the pleasure she supplies. Hal tries to appease Rebecca with a physical gift, a watch, but quickly realizes he could rewind time and figure out a better way to handle the situation.
Sanctuary turns on its head when Rebecca starts dominating Hal as her true self and not as a character she has written. She sees an avenue to make herself some money and make herself indispensable. Hal finds himself with his back up against the wall because of the way he tried to distance himself from her and their unique relationship. The script rips through the psychology of sexual domination and how it relates to reality, which makes the character of Hal incredibly defensive because he doesn’t want to admit to the fact he has a submissive personality. Hal thinks that he can’t operate the business his dad built without being a power hungry, respected figure. Rebecca cites how she believes she knows Hal better than he knows himself. She comes in only getting the scripts she is given, from which she can see Hal working through his own inner demons subconsciously.
Speaking for myself, I love movies where the words are sharper than swords could ever be. Some of the incisions that Rebecca is able to needle Hal with had me pumping my first. Is that fucked up? Maybe. But Margaret Qualley is great and infuses power in her eyes and voice when she is playing the reality based Rebecca. Because the character of Rebecca is paid to give performances, there is an underlying uncertainty as to whether or not her real self is trusted. Is this just a power play? Who knows. It’s a constant battle in the viewer’s head, and it’s accentuated with the camera blackmail/argument that’s a constant throughline in her and Hal’s battle for dominance.
Admittedly, the last act of Sanctuary loses a bit of its steam. The movie comes to a definitive close that is seemingly happy for all, which seems a bit off-kilter for the vitriol that was laced throughout the majority of the story. Both characters seem to have come with a therapeutic acceptance as to how they view themselves and how they relate to each other. There isn’t a wink of possible emotional back-stabbing or self doubt. Even the low self-esteem Hal seems utterly confident in his final decisive act.
If I am going to self diagnose myself, which is fitting following watching Sanctuary, perhaps I must learn that not every movie is better with an opaque ending. Sanctuary does allow for different interpretations of the ending, so perhaps some viewers think that one of the characters came out well ahead as the credits role. The way I took in the final moments is that both characters equally benefited from the verbal abuse given out to one another.
From here on out I am going to get into spoilers for Sanctuary, so if you have been enticed to watch Sanctuary, it is streaming on Hulu.
The mutual happy ending reading of Sanctuary is both similar and remarkably different from a different 2023 movie about power dynamics. Fair Play (2023) dropped on Netflix in October 2023 and also delves into the idea of the “upper-hand” within a relationship. The scripts differ in many ways.
In Fair Play, the characters of Emily (Phoebe Dynevor) and Luke (Alden Ehrenreich) are having sex within minutes of us seeing them on screen. They both work for the same company and have to be in public and hide their relationship from their co-workers. In Fair Play it’s Emily who got promoted to a new position and it’s Luke who is forced to adjust, yet is having difficulty doing so. Come the end of their tragic romance, Luke rapes Emily in an unconscious way of showing control, but Emily uses that against him in the end and forces him to bleed before never seeing him again and lying to her employer about their relationship. Yet when you think Emily has come out ahead, you see the fragile confidence shatter when another young female employee is brought in to replace Luke.
Think about how many things are different in Sanctuary. The characters of Rebecca and Hal don’t have sex till the very end. Rebecca initiates the sex and KNIFE POINT, which would normally constitute some sort of crime, but because of the submissive personality of Hal, he likes it. These two are not a couple at the start of Sanctuary, but at the end they are blossoming to become one, and Hal invites Rebecca to take on the CEO position within the franchise that he owns. In the end its happiness on both sides and the two are now conjoined in their success.
Fair Play works much better in my mind because you have a “winner” in Emily within the power dynamic of the relationship, yet this “winner” is also going down a losing path because she sees her fate sitting down right next to her. It’s a constant battle for domination for Emily, and this time she has to fight a new enemy, and it may very well be a version of herself. In Sanctuary, there isn’t a continued fight. It’s like a ceasefire is called. A treaty is brokered. Perhaps is a fucked up mindset of mine that in my fictional preferences, I’d like to see evolving emotional conflict and be left pondering how the characters will address it.
Sanctuary has its framework down pat, and director Zachary Wigon obviously the very-short 18 day production with a confidence in his vision. The conviction put onto the screen makes Sanctuary work even its lesser moments. It has you buying into the craziest of arguments and antics. Margaret Qualley looks to be having a blast playing the part of Rebecca, and the way she infuses distrust in her character makes it compelling to the very end. If you are a fan of heavy-dialogue drama that places its arguments in the court of public subjective opinion, then Sanctuary will work as a tasty watch. Its introduction and heavy sexual domination motif may be a bit too make for some, but the payoff is fruitful for those who buy in.
STANKO RATING: B-
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