“Send Help,” the newest Sam Raimi film, lands firmly in the genre for “no one is coming to save you” cinema–where protagonists are forced to rely solely on themselves, rejecting a more traditional rescue narrative. Rather than settling for what the internet often dismisses as a “good for her” movie (a term used for movies where women’s suffering is framed as empowerment without deeper critique), it feels far more deliberate, as it treats the protagonist’s rage as a cumulative response to her bad workplace environment. It’s a sharp, unsettling feminist thriller project that emphasizes female rage, office-space neglect and survival at its core.
Throughout the first part of the film, Linda (Rachel McAdams) a strategy and planning executive, is constantly overlooked, dismissed and subtly mocked—largely for not belonging to the younger cohort of the office and for fully inhabiting a nine-to-five work culture. Linda eats lunch in her cubicle and keeps her head down while doing her job. When her boss Bradley (Dylan O’Brien) and his inner circle stumble upon a video revealing her interest in the outdoors and survival skills, it becomes yet another excuse for ridicule, dismissed as dorky rather than impressive.
Later, those very skills prove essential, when their plane crashes and the only survivors, Linda and Bradley, end up stranded in a deserted island. Yet even then, Bradley cannot resist diminishing her. This dynamic becomes a sharp portrayal of how some men objectify women—not sexually, but functionally—treating them as pawns in their own lives, as people who exist to serve and support them.
Coming from a character as privileged as Bradley, who comes from a wealthy family, acts entitled and has had most opportunities in life directly handed to him, this attitude is especially striking: the expectation that Linda should be eternally grateful, paired with the unearned confidence of “I can do this better than you,” even when the skills in question are ones he has never taken the time to learn or develop.
All in all, while much of “Send Help” leans into satire and camp, its resolution of Linda being the only to survive in the end and building a raft that gets her found by civilization— and the film’s climax of earned, simmering female rage — hits a deeply satisfying nerve. It resonates especially with women who have felt overlooked or diminished in professional settings, much like Linda herself.
There is also an undeniable irony in watching McAdams portray a so-called “weird accounting lady” (as the film mockingly labels her) now that she is over 45, when she was once almost exclusively cast as a bombshell. That contrast feels intentional. This is precisely the point the film seems to be pointing at, making the role stand as a strong addition to McAdams’ filmography, further proving the range she has always possessed as an actor.
Send Help uses tone and narrative to show the cathartic climax where she decides to kill Bradley and position herself as the only survivor from the crash, pushed by the build up of years and years of professional erasure. Even though this is camp and satire, it reads as a strong message urging women to not diminish themselves in their industry and/or place of work, be proud of their passions and interest while not letting men tell them those are unimportant or unskillful, which, in my opinion comes across as extremely woman-forwad and feminist.