With bank accounts dryer than the cracking dirt beneath their feet, two women (Julia Garner and Jessica Henwick) are forced to quit their partying in Sydney and take work tending bar in a part of the outback so barren the kangaroos have even up and left. The watering hole is seemingly the only thing for miles, leaving these ladies to quickly become acquainted with the local clientele. The Financial District may be as slimy as it gets, but the creatures that slink their way through these doors only need a few moments to show their true colors; with Green and her team grinding the tone to unnerving levels, cat calls are unfortunately the least of our worries. With incisive, strong writing, the entire picture is baked in a realism that bends its dramatic tension into moments that end up being scarier than anything you’d see in a traditional horror film. Garner and Henwick balance and lift each other nicely in roles far more complex than you might expect. Following up her striking debut, The Assistant (also starring Garner), Green is staking her claim as one of our foremost chroniclers of women’s survival in this masculine hellscape we call a world. Even with a finale that may lean slightly toward fantasy, every moment feels earned because of the risks it takes to present female thoughts and fears in illuminating, potentially revelatory, fashion.

⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

Available in limited theaters.